how to pass on the torch to the next generation

if anyone has been following the past couple of weeks in the mispacha weekly magazine, then you’ll have been reading, and educating yourself with regards to “on the fringe”. before responding to this please do yourself and your kids a big favor and read that article, as well as the responses that followed some weeks later.

after reading all that scary but informative and but true info, pleae can anyone tell me “what are we now going to do to improve this situation?” i’m not labeling this a crisis, b/c no one likes dealing with crisis’s, we only like to debate them and point fingers at who we think is responsible.

we really do have the power to change this tide for the better, i think that we simply have to start teaching real emunah to our children at a young age for many reasons. firstly and mainly, so that they will come to the point of relating to Hashem as something really real, not “something” limited to “chas v’shalom”, “b’ezras Hashem”, and “bli ayin horah”! something that many in our generation are limited to.

why is it that someone has to feel that he is the world’s biggest “harry” if he talks about Hashem? why is discussing Hashem so taboo? shouldn’t we be comfortable to talk about Him, especially when all of us are all going through all the motions anyway? would’t our davening look drastically different if we felt it?

we are all very happy to be “a poseter yid” without any stick, to be honest, learn in kollel, or work, and learn on the side. but lets think to the future for a moment.

there is a story from the chofetz chaim, that he was at the mikva and the water was cold, so he asked the caretaker about it, who responded, “go look at the heating stone, its still pretty warm”, ant the chofetz chaim responded for then and for all future parents, and mechanchim: if the stone is not HOT then it might keep it self warm, but it CANNOT heat anything else!”

meaning, we can be happy with our own mediocre yiddishkeit, but then how can we expect our children to take the “heat” from us?

we have to be HOT for them, it’s their only chance!