While my custom is to write something original about the week's parashah or about some recent event, it seemed very appropriate, given the delicate situation of the La Plata community, to transcribe some words that the Rebbe spoke on March 4, 1973, in front of a group of young people from the Young Leadership Cabinet, an institution of Young Jewish Leaders in the United States.
The words speak for themselves. The strength of a community comes from the sum of the strengths of each of its members, plus a specific added value derived from the sanctity of a Jewish community. So, when the members themselves, and first and foremost, the leaders of the community rise up, the entire community rises up, and vice versa.
May God grant that we may know how to apply the Rebbe's words, each in our own city, according to our ability.
""There is one special goal that takes priority above all others, and that is education. By educating people, you are preparing the young leaders of tomorrow and the day after tomorrow. Education is not a matter of making someone uneducated into someone educated, or more educated; someone who is not fluent into someone fluent; someone who is not charitable into someone charitable, or more charitable. Education now is a matter of saving a soul, saving a human being for the Jewish people. And saving them for humanity.".
Considering that a child is someone whose educational needs should be met at the earliest possible opportunity, one can borrow money now and repay it tomorrow, or the day after. Even if one has no more money in cash or in promises, it is the first priority, the first duty, and the first obligation of every Jew who can do something in this regard to invest in education.
I'm not asking for a check. What I'm asking is that each of you, before asking someone for a check tomorrow, become more Jewish than you were yesterday by adding at least one mitzvah to your personal life, your private life, and the life of your family. And furthermore, and I know this from my own experience, I am now seventy years old, and yet I hope that tomorrow morning I will be a better Jew than I am today. Fulfilling a mitzvah in your private life, as a private individual, has an immediate impact on your community activities."