Meet an innoFaither: Sara Luria
Meet Sara Luria, rabbi, community builder, and Executive Director of Beloved, a fiscal sponsorship and community hub for spiritual innovators. Sara, who is based in Western Massachusetts, brings to her work a deep appreciation of her Jewish identity and community, and a conviction that we are living in a generative in-between time that calls for experimentation.
What faith(s), if any, do you practice? How does your tradition and/or spiritual practice inspire or influence you as an innovator?
I'm Jewish, and I feel really rich in tradition. What Judaism at its best offers is accompaniment through your life. For every moment, every transition, every morning, every holiday, there's ritual, text, and connection. We have our sad time, our atonement time, our excitement time, our party time. There's a whole rollercoaster of the year with things being offered. You get to decide how you want to plug in based on how it relates to your life. There is no time in my life that I don't feel accompanied by tradition, renewal, and ritual.
As for innovation, I don't think we need innovation around Judaism itself. Judaism has it all. I feel overwhelming abundance. What we need is innovation around Judaism's delivery methodologies. How do we get that abundance to people who are feeling scarcity or emptiness, or who are seeking? That's where the innovation comes in.
I've inherited innovation. The job of a Jewish spiritual leader for the last 2,000 years — since the destruction of the Second Temple — has been to take ancient tradition and make it relevant to the people sitting in front of them. That's the job. So I don't think of myself as especially innovative. I think of myself as doing what Jewish spiritual leaders have always done.
In the Talmud, the rabbis would say “go out and see what the people are doing,” and then they would respond to that. So it’s in our text that if the people are doing something new, you don’t have to bring them back to the way. Rather, sometimes the law gets written out of what the people are doing.
I love Martin Buber's image of pouring metal into a mold — you can't do it little by little, it has to all be poured at once. Right now, I feel like there's a whole new mold being shaped that we can pour ourselves into. And that's not abandoning Judaism — our teachers and philosophers have told us to do exactly this.
What are you currently working on?
I’m trying to understand the new emerging ecosystem of Jewish life that's happening in America. We’re living in an in-between time in every realm of our lives — in politics, capitalism, climate. We know it's not going to be what it was in the 20th century, but we don't know yet what the next thing is. Judaism in America is also in a very challenging in-between time. Instead of claiming I know the answer, let's try a lot of things. That's the only stance that feels full of integrity to me right now.
One experiment we’re working on is a new economic model for spiritual innovation, spiritual leadership, and spiritual life. Capitalism clearly doesn't work for this. We fiscally sponsor over 100 projects and are trying to figure out if we can build a sustainable mutual system where we support each other financially, administratively, and programmatically, instead of everyone doing their own thing in isolation.
We also hold a festival each year that brings together our fiscally sponsored projects and people from around the country, an opportunity to come see what the people are doing.
Another experiment is local here in Western Massachusetts. We built a space called the Beloved Center for Creative Practice to harness the creativity of Jewish artists, innovators, and culture-makers in the region — many of whom are on the margins because they're disabled or queer or simply because we’re out here in a place that is not the center of the universe. There is a lot of interesting creativity here. We're seeing what can emerge when people have a space to be together and learn from each other.
Finally, I'm working with a colleague on mapping and convening a new emerging ecosystem of what we're calling liberated and liberatory Judaism, connecting organizations around the country practicing this kind of Judaism who haven't yet found each other.
What can we find you doing when you're not working?
Pilates, walking to my local coffee shop, lots of time with my three kids — all the good stuff and all the hard stuff that comes with that. Also, I love reading so much. And flowers are now a hobby. I'm a Brooklyn girl who never thought she'd want a garden, but lately I've gotten into it. Beauty is one of my love languages, and I’m ready for some beauty.
What is piquing your curiosity these days?
I’m wondering about how prescriptive culture is. I was just in Paris, and I noticed how people have coffee with someone before work, then lunch is two hours, then all the restaurants are full at 8 pm with people talking to friends. Leisure and beauty and attending to your own needs is part of the culture there. It made me ask: can you shape that life without the culture helping you there? Living in this capitalist time, with all the chaos we're navigating, is it possible to truly cultivate pleasure, beauty, leisure, and community? Or are we just Sisyphus? That's the question I'm really sitting with.
What is something you'd like help on?
I want help with exactly that question. Do we have to live in this crouched stance of productivity and never-enough? Or can we — in this innovation world — build prefigurative communities and organizations where we actually get to try out a different way of being together? Can we build something that doesn't feel so crushing?
What is something you can offer others in the innoFaith network?
There's nothing I like more than a one-on-one strategy session with an innovator. Supporting spiritual leaders in their spiritual, emotional, administrative, and financial lives — just one-on-one on Zoom or in person — is probably in my top three best uses. I can't do it infinitely, but I really treasure it and I'm good at it.
Additionally, in July, Beloved will be accepting new applications from organizations seeking fiscal sponsorship. We welcome spiritual innovators rooted in any tradition.
You can reach Sara at belovedgarden.org or via Email.
Meet an innoFaither is our series to introduce the inspiring optimists in the innoFaith world and what they’re working on and thinking about. We hope it helps you find and engage with each other across the network to advance faith-rooted social innovation and interfaith collaboration for social impact. Or just meet some cool people. Find the full series at innofaith.org/meet-an-innofaither.