You can find the digital edition of the Fall 2024 magazine embedded under our note—and a link to an episode of the Bonjour Chai podcast talking about the cover and contents, along with a transcript from the conversation.
In a typical year, planning the stories we will publish for the High Holiday season tends to be a somewhat straightforward matter: we draw on holiday traditions, reflect on the year that has ended, and anticipate what we may expect in the year ahead.
This is not a typical year.
When we sat down to discuss the fall issue of our quarterly magazine, we confronted a heartbreaking, unavoidable truth: this period in the Jewish calendar, which is always a time for both celebration and reflection, is also now a terrible yahrzeit, and will unfold against the backdrop of an ongoing war.
As we would go on to write in the introduction to one of the pieces in the magazine, a photo retrospective of the past 12 months, this year Canadian Jews have been in mourning, afraid, angry, determined, recommitted, questioning, in solidarity, and sometimes also at odds with one another—often several of these at once. How, we asked ourselves, could we show this nuanced and difficult reality?
The answer is on the cover of the magazine, which depicts a family at a holiday table coming together over their shared Judaism despite their political differences, and in the stories you’ll find within its pages. Our goal was simple: capture the complexities of the current time with love for our community and without shying away from the difficulties.
This year, many families will be sitting side by side at the dinner table discussing some of the most important issues facing Canadian Jewry, whether that’s antisemitism at work or on college campuses, how to live as a Jew in today’s climate, or the ongoing war in the Middle East. One of the distinctive and defining features of Judaism is that it is built on diversity of thought: Midrash, Talmud, responsas, the various contemporary movements within Judaism—all of these can be understood as different Jews wrestling with and sometimes disagreeing about what Judaism means and calls upon us to do.
This is a particularly fraught time to be considering such questions and this year, perhaps more than most, there will be people around the table who don’t see eye to eye on every issue; there may be heated, but hopefully healthy, debate. While difficult, this is also very important: the more we understand each other, the closer our community will become during these challenging times.
The issue, which we hope you read from cover to cover, has already garnered more reaction than any other in recent memory, and the responses have been as varied as the Jews that are depicted on the cover. Readers have written to express both dismay and gratitude—often for the very same images or ideas. Editorially speaking, it is precisely because we have love for the community that we feel it is so important not to shy away from difficult conversations.
As a 65-year-old publication whose mission is to bring people together from across our community and shed light on the realities that Jews face today, we believe it is important to try and have these conversations. We hope that the current issue of the magazine helps you, your family, and your loved ones do just that.
Wishing you a Shanah Tovah, and in hope of better times ahead,
The Canadian Jewish News
