Preaching Goes Viral

Kiddush Hashem, Now More Than Ever (Second Primary Source)

Analogies to Mythic Narratives

On April 14th, 2000, the New York Times wrote a moving article about two families, one in Brooklyn and one in Italy. Miriam and Rabbi Ronald Barry had gotten tested in 1991 to see if they could be bone marrow donors. A few months later, a match came up for Rabbi Barry. There is a small risk, 1 in 20,000, associated with giving bone marrow. It is a small risk, but it is a risk nonetheless. Rabbi Barry decided to be a donor. As the New York Times wrote: ''How many people,'' Mrs. Barry asked, ''get the opportunity to say, 'I saved a life'? What a thing to take up with you at the end of days.'' After the bone donation, the recipient's family decided to reach out to the Barrys. The donation had gone to a 9-year-old boy named Nicola Trevisan in a small village of Tonco in the Asti region of Italy. The families began to correspond and to become friendly. And then in 2000 the Barrys went to visit Italy. The Trevisans, who had never met Jews before, took a crash course on the rules of Kashrut in order to host the Barry's. The Trevisons set up an entire day's tour for the Barry's, and located a nearby historic synagogue and had it opened. In the synagogue's guest book, Armando Trevisan wrote: ''This is the reunion of the Barry family of Brooklyn and the Trevisans of Tonco..". And that night, at the Tonco city hall, the entire village came out to welcome and thank the Barrys. One act of kindness had touched hundreds of people on the other side of the world.

2022-12-13

Rabbi Chaim Steinmetz

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