For the last few years on Rosh Hashanah eve I’ve told a story that comes from the baseball world, with the hopes that we might be able to sense a moral message in the story to begin the holiday season with.  Some of you may remember that I spoke a few years ago about Fred Merkle, the hapless Giants outfielder who cost his team a pennant when he failed to run to second base.  Last year I told the story of the umpire who took a perfect game away from a pitcher with a bad call.  And its always fun to talk about baseball, because - well, because its baseball, and this is the time of year when baseball is at its best.  But, believe it or not, I do know that not everyone is a baseball fan, and looking back speaking about baseball on Rosh Hashanah eve hasn’t done the Orioles any good, and it certainly hasn’t helped my beloved and constantly beleaguered Mets. 
     So I thought this erev Rosh Hashanah I would tell you a different kind of story, that has nothing to do with baseball, but quite a bit to do with shul, or at least why we come to shul.  And this being the time of year when we come to shul more than any other time, I thought perhaps it might be a nice thing to think about at the start of our sacred days.
     The story is about two older men who are close friends, one named Cohen, and the other named Greenberg.  For many, many years Cohen and Greenberg have been attending the daily morning minyan at their local shul - they were what we call in the business regulars, they never missed a day.
     But of course every story needs to have a problem, because if it didn’t it wouldn’t be a story, and the problem in this story is that although Greenberg was a man of deep faith, Cohen, he was an atheist - he did not believe in God.  And even that wouldn’t be such a problem except for the fact that Cohen’s wife knew he didn’t believe in God, and so she wasn’t so happy when every day the alarm would go off at 6AM so that Cohen could get to shul for the minyan.  And finally one day she became so exasperated about this that when Cohen came home from shul she began to give him a hard time.  And she said:  “ I understand that Greenberg goes to shul every day, he is a believer,  it means something to him - he sits, he prays, he talks to God - but you, you don’t believe, so why do you go?”  And Cohen looked at his wife, and he said very calmly, ‘You know, Greenberg goes to shul to talk to God, and I go to shul to talk to Greenberg.”
    Now after hearing the story we know why Cohen and Greenberg go to shul, but I guess what I hope the story helps us to think about tonight, at the beginning of a new year is why we go to shul.  Why are we here tonight?  Why will we come back tomorrow for those long hours of prayer, and hopefully the day after, and then we’ll be here again on Yom Kippur.  
     Of course some of us, maybe even many of us, come for the same reasons Cohen and Greenberg come.  There are those of us who are people of faith, we are believers, and this is a time of year when we sense God’s presence more than at any other time.  Those are the Greenbergs among us - those who come to shul on the holidays to talk to God.  But I would be willing to bet that there are quite a few of us who come to shul as ‘Cohens’ tonight, and throughout the holidays.  We are not quite sure what we think about God, or if we believe, or how we believe, but we feel connected to this community, to the people we’ve known for many years, to the Jewish people, and we look forward each year to seeing familiar faces, and catching up with old friends, and seeing new faces, a child or grandchild, perhaps coming to shul for the very first time.
     And I know there are many other reasons why we gather together in a house of worship on these sacred days.  Sometimes it might not even mean that much to us, but we know it means an awful lot to a parent or a grandparent that we love - and so we come for them.  Some of us come determined to be examples to our own children or grandchildren, with the hopes that in the distant future, when we are not here, they will be, and that it will mean something to them.  We come because we feel obligated, or because we feel guilty if we don’t.  We come to hear beautiful music by the Cantor and the choir, and maybe a few people even come to hear the Rabbi’s sermon.
     More than anything else, we come because we are Jews, and something stirs in our souls when the hot days of summer begin to give way to the cool nights of fall.  A year is ending, and a new year is about to begin.  We are asked by our tradition to review our lives, and we are given by our tradition the chance to start a new life.  To let go of the challenges and disappointments and sadnesses of the past, and to embrace the possibilities of the future.  
     Some of you may remember Robert Benchley, an actor, writer, and humorist who was very popular in the 1920s and 30s.  One of the quotes often attributed to him is that  there are two kinds of people in the world - those who believe there are two kinds of people, and those who don’t.  And of course the truth is we don’t come to shul on the holidays for any one reason.  We all have a little bit of Cohen, and a little bit of Greenberg in us.  We are here tonight and the days that follow because we want talk to our friends, we want to spend time with our families, and we want to feel connected to a community that cares about us;  at the same time, we’ll do our best to talk to God a little bit too, and we’ll hope that when we do, God in some way receives our prayers, knows our thoughts and feelings, and touches our hearts. 
     But you know there is one other conversation that I hope we are all able to have this High Holy Day season, and this conversation, I think, is more difficult by far that talking with our friends, and even more difficult that talking with God - it is the conversation that we need to have with ourselves.  That is an internal, private conversation - what we call in Hebrew a Heshbon Hanefesh - an opportunity for introspection and self reflection and a serious consideration of our lives.  Are we the kind of people WE want to be?  The kinds of fathers and mothers, husbands and wives, sons and daughters and sisters and brothers that we always hoped we would be?  The holidays remind us that the internal conversation that answers those questions, is possibly the most important conversation we can ever have.  Because the holidays also remind us, that when we take a hard look, and think about who we really are, we are given an opportunity, through that process, to be the people we want to be.
     In the year that is about to begin, we will be involved with countless conversations - a few of them will be with God, many of them with family and friends, and with other companions that we meet along the way, and one or two with ourselves.  May each and everyone of them bring meaning into our lives, a little bit more goodness and peace into the world, and a sense of sacred spirit to our days.
and this year may we all be inscribed in the book of life - for sweetness and health, for family and friendship, and for faith -