Rabbi Levi A. Olan: The Conscience of the City

As we read Rabbi Olan’s sermons every week, we notice a question which frequently comes to the fore:  What do you think is the good [we should] cherish most?  In other words, what is most …

“The history of religion presents a sorry spectacle.” October 26, 1969 In addressing what he called the Christian-Jewish encounter in 1969, Rabbi Olan walked a fine line between righteous indignation and even-handedness.  On the one …

“Men and women today live in an imbalance.  Our emphasis is upon the practical, the rational, the logical.  We are alien to the world which can be known only by experience, by feeling….  There is …

“The phenomenal achievement of the human mind exhibited in the journey to the moon illuminates in shining brightness the sickness of the human condition.” On July 21, 1969, Neil Armstrong became the first person to …

“Science is my shepherd, I shall not want.” Rabbi Olan concluded the broadcast year on April 27, 1969 with a sermon containing familiar themes.* One of these was the assertion that humans are spiritual beings …

“Can prayer have any meaning at all for a modern person?  If it cannot ask God to set aside the laws of nature and perform a miracle, and if it is not aimed at changing …

“There is a time when we must speak, when to remain silent is immoral.“ Radio listeners in the DFW area who tuned in to the Temple Emanu-El Program on Sunday, December 7, 1969, heard Rabbi …

“If we could live our lives all over again, what changes would we make?  How differently would we do things from what we did in the past?” December 28, 1969 found Rabbi Olan in a …

“If there is no justice, there can be no peace.” In this sermon, Rabbi Olan wrestles with an intractable problem: he believes that all wars are immoral, but that some wars are also just or …