{"id":25576,"date":"2026-06-23T18:04:50","date_gmt":"2026-06-23T12:34:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/this-8-am-zoom-service-has-become-a-satellite-of-love\/"},"modified":"2026-06-23T18:04:50","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T12:34:50","slug":"this-8-am-zoom-service-has-become-a-satellite-of-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/this-8-am-zoom-service-has-become-a-satellite-of-love\/","title":{"rendered":"This 8 am Zoom service has become a satellite of love"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div itemprop=\"articleBody\">\n<p><iframe title=\"Everlit Audio Player\" src=\"https:\/\/everlit.audio\/embeds\/artl_GK70XTRx9xa?client=wp&amp;client_version=3.2.3\" width=\"100%\" height=\"136px\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>(RNS) \u2014 The 8 a.m. service starts with a litany of gratitude, which unfurls in the chat function of the online Zoom:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGrateful to be awake.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGrateful for the last day of school.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGrateful for this morning to pray.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGrateful for morning minyan.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>On the main screen, the prayer leader, typically a rabbi, begins to chant blessings and psalms from the Jewish morning service. In the gallery, participants sit in front of their laptops, some with prayer shawls draped over their shoulders, others with the video turned off and only a profile picture or a name.<\/p>\n<p>So begins the 30-minute morning service offered through the Los Angeles-based <a href=\"https:\/\/ikar.org\/\">IKAR<\/a> Synagogue six days a week. For many Jews, in L.A. and beyond, it has become their primary form of community and prayer \u2014 as necessary as a morning cup of coffee.<\/p>\n<p>The service offers Jews with varying degrees of observance an opportunity to say the central prayer of Jewish life \u2014 the Shema \u2014 and for some to recite the kaddish, or mourner\u2019s prayer, which Jews are required to say daily for 11 months after the death of a family member.<\/p>\n<p>Initially a stopgap measure during the first days of the COVID-19 pandemic, the virtual service has turned into a daily source of spiritual sustenance. Many of its most devoted participants have formed not only commitments to their faith but also enduring friendships and ongoing support for their fellow service members.<\/p>\n<p>They describe the experience in spiritual terms.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s a Lou Reed song called \u2018Satellite of Love,\u2019 and that\u2019s how I picture it,\u201d said Leah Matsui, 70, who logs on every day from Kumamoto, Japan, alongside her husband. \u201cHere\u2019s the globe, and here\u2019s us. And when we say the Shema, that goes up to the satellite of love, which transmits the sound to L.A. Just at that moment, it might be as close as I get to Hashem (God) in the day.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In Jewish law, some prayers can only be said communally, in a quorum of 10 Jewish adults, called a minyan. When the COVID lockdown began in March 2020, that posed an immediate problem.<\/p>\n<p>On March 17, 2020, an assistant rabbi at IKAR inaugurated the first morning minyan service on Zoom.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were all kind of new to Zoom, and the rabbi started by saying to each person by name, \u201cI see you. Good morning. Good to see you,\u201d said Jody Kussin, 66, a clinical psychologist who became ordained as a rabbi after attending the morning service. \u201cI immediately teared up. It was so nice to be seen.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That feeling of being seen online was critical. People were isolating and lonely. Some were in mourning and in need of saying the kaddish prayer communally.<\/p>\n<p>From the get-go, the service had no problem attracting a quorum, and soon it grew. On the morning of Oct. 9, 2023, two days after the Hamas attack on Israel, the morning minyan drew 110 people. These days, it draws an average of 40 to 60 people six days a week.<\/p>\n<p>The structure of the service evolved over time. It now features a playlist of uplifting folk and pop songs in English and Hebrew welcoming people in, followed by a few minutes of shared gratitude on the chat. A set of rabbis, a cantor or a lay leader welcomes everyone and then begins chanting the morning prayers from an online prayer book, or siddur, posted via a link in the chat. The service leader typically sets aside a few minutes for a very short talk and announcements.<\/p>\n<p>The highlight for many participants is the kaddish prayer. While participants are muted for most of the service, those mourning the death of a loved one are allowed to unmute for the kaddish prayer and then take turns saying a sentence or two about who they are mourning.<\/p>\n<p>Although only about a third of participants are grieving the loss of a loved one, publicly supporting mourners is an important part of the service.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve been with people in the most horribly tragic times, including parents who\u2019ve lost children to suicide and addiction,\u201d said Laurie Hall, a Zoom host or gabbai (service facilitator). \u201cIt\u2019s really become this incredibly profound sacred space.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Recently, participants extended a litany of get well wishes for 82-year-old Dick Greenblatt of Toledo, Ohio, a regular, was admitted to the hospital. His name appeared dozens of times in the online chat as part of the \u201cMi Shebeirach\u201d prayer.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_4265290\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"width: 640px;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/religionnews.com\/webrns-zoom-minyan-1-20260622\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-4265290 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/webRNS-zoom-minyan-1-20260622-807x382.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"303\" srcset=\"https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/webRNS-zoom-minyan-1-20260622-807x382.jpg 807w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/webRNS-zoom-minyan-1-20260622-427x202.jpg 427w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/webRNS-zoom-minyan-1-20260622-768x363.jpg 768w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/webRNS-zoom-minyan-1-20260622-1536x726.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/webRNS-zoom-minyan-1-20260622-1600x756.jpg 1600w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/webRNS-zoom-minyan-1-20260622-300x142.jpg 300w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/webRNS-zoom-minyan-1-20260622-600x284.jpg 600w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/webRNS-zoom-minyan-1-20260622.jpg 1910w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\"\/><\/a> <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text edd-enabled\"><span class=\"caption\">Los Angeles based IKAR synagogue hosts a daily morning minyan, occasionally led Rabbi Paula Marcus, a volunteer service leader. Video screengrab<\/span><span class=\"credit\"\/><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Minyan participants don\u2019t need much encouragement to Zoom one-on-one with people who are struggling or grieving or just want to talk.<\/p>\n<p>Deep friendships have formed among people who rarely see one another in person.<\/p>\n<p>Hall, the morning minyan Zoom host, lives in San Diego but has become fast friends with Kussin, who lives in the San Fernando Valley, about a two-hour drive away.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve maybe seen each other a couple of times each year since 2020, but we talk on the phone all the time,\u201d said Hall.<\/p>\n<p>Each morning service concludes with a brief blessing from Barbara Zacky, an ordained rabbi and a a member of the congregation who improvises a one or two sentence sendoff. It typically concludes with, \u201cDon\u2019t forget to hydrate!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The purpose of the blessing, Zacky said, is \u201cto send people off on their day with a sense that the service is not just cut off. It\u2019s continuing to breathe.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For Matsui, who participates daily from Japan \u2014 even as it means waking up for the service in the wee hours of the morning \u2014 it\u2019s the connection with others that makes it worthwhile.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI would love to just be alone with the prayer book, but to be a Jew means you have to be in community,\u201d said Matsui.<\/p>\n<p>Matsui said she appreciates how the service forces people to put aside their frustrations for 30 minutes and focus on gratitude and\u00a0 caring for others.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou get to see everybody rowing the boat, everybody wanting to say, \u2018I\u2019m so grateful the plumber came.\u2019 Things could be in total collapse, but at least there\u2019s one thing you could put in the chat.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><!-- CONTENT END 1 -->\n        <\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/religionnews.com\/2026\/06\/23\/this-8-am-service-has-become-a-satellite-of-love\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(RNS) \u2014 The 8 a.m. service starts with a litany of gratitude, which unfurls in the chat function of the online Zoom: \u201cGrateful to be awake.\u201d \u201cGrateful for the last day of school.\u201d \u201cGrateful for this morning to pray.\u201d \u201cGrateful for morning minyan.\u201d On the main screen, the prayer leader, typically a rabbi, begins to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25577,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25576"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25576\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25577"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}