President Obama Says Yom Kippur a Time for Honesty and Reflection
President Barack Obama said Yom Kippur was a time of hope and also of being honest with oneself.
“The Day of Atonement is a time for humility, reflection and repentance, a chance to be honest with ourselves and one another about our shortcomings,” he said in a message sent out about two hours before East Coast candle-lighting. “Yet Yom Kippur is also a day of hope. Through our prayers and through our actions, as individuals and as a community, we can better bridge the realities of our world with the ideals and values we share.”
Obama concluded with the Hebrew phrase wishing others to be signed in the book of life for the coming year — “G’mar Chatimah Tovah.”
A number of candidates for the Republican nod in the presidential election sent out greetings through Twitter, among them Donald Trump, the real estate magnate and front-runner, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30
