Communal leadership during war and peace - opinion

Community and religious leadership is important in times of national disaster, but when the flames die down, communities will have to adapt to accommodate all those who feel changed following the horrors.

The people of Israel are going through a national trauma. With so few degrees of separation, most people in this small country can, without difficulty, trace a linkage between themselves and a victim of the October 7 massacre, a fallen soldier, or a missing captive. The sense of imminent danger or impending grief lurks in the background for most of the country’s residents who are bound together in shared fear, hope, and grief. At times of war or extreme uncertainty, Israel can feel like one big community, supporting one another and praying for the well-being of all its people. 

A sense of community is an important psychological strength. In times of distress, feeling part of a wider community has been demonstrated to support coping and well-being. Community belonging goes beyond just making us feel good, it can promote a sense of purpose, enhance a feeling of control and agency, and has even been demonstrated to bolster physical health. 

While community belonging can be achieved through societal endeavors, activism, and community living in Israel and the Jewish Diaspora, religious communities are a natural home both at times of peace and at times of distress. During the current tragedies, religious communities have united to support one another; pray for those at risk; and provide a sense of stability, hope, and purpose. Yet for those who have been exposed to traumatic experiences, what once felt like a home, can quickly underscore a sense of isolation and alienation. 

Exposure to the depths of moral depravity can cause people to question previously held religious beliefs. Strong convictions regarding a greater power or ultimate good can be shaken by directly experienced life-threatening events and by witnessing acts of betrayal, brutality, disregard, or morally questionable behavior. Specifically in battlegrounds, high in human suffering, both that of comrades and of the enemy or vulnerable populations, many soldiers return with changes in their levels of faith and religious affiliation. Indeed many returning recruits search for meaning and belonging by traveling to spiritual and ritualistic retreats, while others withdraw from previously held religious and spiritual affiliations.

Communal leaders must be flexible while also maintaining the norm

Communal leaders are on the front lines of the current war. From rousing speeches to soldiers entering Gaza to fight, to supporting families with loved ones kidnapped or at war. But for many, their relationship to their community, to the community’s leadership, and to previously held dogmas will have changed. There is a common belief that religious people can get through trauma by maintaining a strong belief in God – but for many, that image of a righteous, God-fearing victim eats at the heart of their identity. Religious trauma survivors (of both life-threatening and moral traumas) can often feel an increased level of guilt that their faith has been shaken. 

I’ve worked with mothers unable to take comfort from the community because they no longer hold unwavering belief; children silenced by the dissonance between their experiences and their community teaching; and young adults, still searching for their place in the world, attempting to process their traumatic experience in the shade of religious doctrine that now feels unfamiliar or unfulfilling. 

True for many, and especially important for those who have experienced trauma, communities nevertheless provide a sense of stability, familiarity, and control. Maintaining communal ties is important in the process of healing from traumas that fragment and destabilize. This can involve the preservation of regular prayer schedules or religious study. That said, communal leaders must also realize that observance comes at a price. While the structure and format of communal worship have stayed the same, the congregants themselves may have changed. 

The challenge to communal leaders is to maintain the norm while accepting the divergent. 

We need to prepare ourselves to listen, to sit with difficult experiences, even those that may challenge our own core beliefs. It is only through enabling people to voice their stories and be heard that we can create a healing space and truly recognize and honor their experiences.

Communal leaders will need to find a way to create the space to recognize the deep personal sacrifice of trauma survivors; to see the pain etched across their hearts that doesn’t allow them to connect to religion in the same way as previously; and to encourage renewed communal participation without the expectation of religious fervor. 

The writer is director of research at METIV, Israel Psychotrauma Center and a clinical psychologist in private practice. With gratitude to Rabbi Yoni Rosensweig, who inspired this article in a conversation we had about understanding trauma in the context of rabbinical practice.