Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, is the most solemn day of the Jewish year — the close of the Ten Days of Repentance that begin at Rosh Hashanah. Tradition marks it with a twenty-five hour fast, from sundown to nightfall the following day, and with an unusually full day of communal reflection.

In a spiritual humanistic frame, we keep the day’s seriousness while relocating its meaning. Atonement here is not a plea for a verdict handed down from outside us; it is an honest accounting we do for ourselves and with one another — naming where we’ve drifted from who we want to be, and recommitting to repair it. The fast is a tool for that seriousness, not an end in itself.

Marking the Day

This week’s fast begins and ends times for a range of locations are kept up to date on our Home page, alongside this week’s Shabbat candle-lighting and Havdalah times.

For a fuller reflection on how to approach the day itself — and why it works better as an exercise in self-acceptance than in guilt — see:

Preparing for Yom Kippur →

G’mar Hatimah Tovah — may you be sealed for good.