The epidemic of which I speak is, the proliferation of inappropriate public outbursts.

Yes, Representative Joe Wilson, tennis star Serena Williams and rap musician Kanye West would all benefit from my suggestion.

I simply suggest that Yom Kippur be declared a national federal holiday and we change its name to National Apology Day.

Most likely it would become no different than most of our other national or federal holidays. We would probably all be out at the shopping malls, looking for bargains and spending money.

Wouldn't that be a great way to celebrate Yom Kippur?

Come to our Herb Gordon annual Yom Kippur- Used Car sale!!

Don't commit the ultimate sin of buying at retail!!

But there are aspects of a national day of apology that might actually be of benefit to us all,

Wouldn't it be helpful and useful to have a national day in our society when anyone who has not yet offered an apology could do so, sincerely, along with the understanding that the apology would be accepted?

Lord knows we need it.

I'm not sure if people are acting out more than in the past but certainly these incidents are receiving an incredible amount of attention.

Remember that wonderful Jim Carrey movie from several years ago "The Truman Show?" It tells the story of a person whose whole life was publicly documented and viewed, from beginning to end.

Everyone knew it, except him. It was the ultimate "reality show."

Today, with Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, life has become very much like that for all of us, only we all are aware of it.

However, human nature gets the best of us every once in a while and we forget how much we're in the camera's view. We goof up, and not only does God know, but so does everyone else real soon.

Unfortunately we become witnesses to some pretty awful behaviors.

I was outraged that Representative Joe Wilson publicly, in the Halls of Congress, called our president a liar.

There is no excuse for the belligerent tone and despicable language used by Serena Williams after what admittedly was a poor call at a critical moment in perhaps the most important women's tennis match of the year.

How many of you saw the tape of Kanye West purposely embarrassing country star Taylor Swift when he walked onstage during the MTV Video awards and pronounced to everyone in assembly that she didn't deserve the award she was receiving.

Now, based upon what we saw in the Jay Leno interview of Kanye West just a day or two later we learned what was bothering Kanye West.

And we know that it had nothing to do with Taylor Swift.

As Kanye West sat with Jay Leno, he shared how he was still suffering from the pain after his mother's death nearly two years ago.

Kanye West's mother, Donda, was a professor of English and the former chairman of the Chicago State University's English Department.

Jay Leno mentioned that he had met Kanye West's mother, and asked him what she would have thought about his behavior the other night.

No one expected the response which followed.

If you saw the video of this interview, you know that Kanye West's body language changed dramatically!

He withdrew physically, bowed his head, and became sullen in his silence, which lasted for about 20 seconds.

As Kanye West attempted to compose himself he said,

"Obviously, I deal with hurt, and so many celebrities, they never take the time off, and I never took the time off, really.

I've really never taken the time off. It's been music after music and tour after tour.

And I'm just ashamed my hurt caused someone else hurt."

Kanye West seems to realize that at least part of the reason why he regularly acts out, and did so at the MTV video awards program, is because he has not taken the appropriate time and means to mourn for his mother since her death almost two years ago.

Rather than exploring appropriate rites of mourning after such an impactful loss, Kanye West tried to return to the same old normal life he had become used to living.

I often counsel people that after the loss of a loved one the goal is eventually to once again feel normal, but not the same old normal. That can never be re-established. Your loved one has died.

But with time, and appropriate rituals of mourning, a new normal can be established. That is the goal we look to achieve after the mourning process is completed, but it takes time and effort.

I enjoyed the privilege of hearing Elie Wiesel speak at St. John's College on Tuesday, September 15. I hope to share with you a little more about that in the future.

Elie Wiesel made it clear that while he commemorates and remembers the holocaust in everything that he does, he is not in a continual state of mourning.

He shared with everyone how Judaism has probably the most elaborate and sophisticated program of mourning that any culture has ever developed.

He said however, there is always a need for mourning to come to an end.

It is a commandment, a mitzvah, not to prolong mourning or continue it beyond the appropriate amount of time. Mourning must come to an end it is Jewish law.

What Elie Wiesel did not say, but easily could have added is that if the mourning process is not worked through properly, what happened to Kanye West, can happen to anyone, unexpectedly.

Ignoring the process of mourning only causes its manifestation to continue indefinitely, sporadically, but indefinitely.

Kanye West needs to take time to mourn the loss of his mother, who was obviously a tremendous influence upon him, and obviously a very accomplished and intelligent woman.

On Yom Kippur the Day of Atonement we apologize, to God, and hopefully prior to this day we apologize to other people

s'lach lanu, m'chal lanu, kaper lanu

Forgive us, Pardon us, Grant us atonement.

How can we know when it's appropriate to apologize?

Let's learn a lesson from Kanye West. Let's learn that anything we do that might embarrass our mothers, or our fathers, is behavior we ought to really reconsider and ponder before performing.

Let's understand the commandment to honor our fathers and mothers as also preventing us from doing anything which might bring them embarrassment.

We know how Kanye West felt about his mother's hypothetical reaction to what he had done imagine how useful it would have been for him to think about that, before he walked up on that stage and publicly embarrassed Taylor Swift.

What a good rule of thumb that might be for all of us before we do anything that seems controversial let's think, would my mother and father be proud of what I'm about to do?

For those of us who have children, of course we want to continually shep nachas, derive joy and pride, from their accomplishments. We believe, and sometimes it might even be true, that some of what they have accomplished is reflective of what we have taught them.

Not all of us have children.

But all of us are children, and all of us have parents. And even after they have passed on, we can bring nachas to them.

Or, we can embarrass them and realize that they would be ashamed of our behavior.

Kanye West knows his mother is ashamed of him, and should be, but I will tell you one more thing

probably, if she is like most other mothers, she already forgives him.

Mothers can be like that, you know.

There is an interesting peculiarity within the Hebrew language that seems to reflect this point about mothers.

Many of you probably know the Hebrew word rachamim. It means mercy.

And if you know basic Hebrew grammar, then you know that the term rachamim has what normally is understood to be a plural ending.

The ending "eem" usually indicates a plural form of a word. So really, the term rachamim should be translated as "mercies."

What is the singular form of rachamim?

Actually, there is no singular form as a noun in Hebrew that can be translated exactly as "mercy." It appears only in the plural form.

The root of the word, raysh, chet, mem, means rechem, which of course is translated into English as "womb."

Many decipher from this root, that the term rachamim, meaning mercies, is derived from the noun which means womb because the quality of compassion, mercy, loving kindness, might usually be more associated, with women than men.

I think that perspective is sexist,

and I think it's also true.

And I think that it is part of the reason why the word only appears in the plural a mother's rachamim is ongoing, and can be experienced in many different ways, over and over again.

Rachamim is not something that is granted for only one moment it is a perspective and approach, a gift, that is given over and over again.

It is what we all hope to receive from God on this day. Last night, I spoke about judgment today, the theme is not only apology, but also the acceptance of apology in the form of rachamim.

Yizkor makes that point very clearly. In a few moments, at the climax of Yizkor, we will hear the prayer that begins with the words, "Ayl malay rachamim God who is full of mercy, compassion.

God is the father and mother to all of us, our parent, who we hope will continue to extend mercy to us on this day. And the prayer "Ayl malay rachamim" proclaims that we expect God will have mercy and compassion upon those who can't plead for themselves, those who have died and those whom we remember along with us today.

If I'm correct in my statement that Judaism commands us to end mourning for our own health and self-improvement, then why do we observe Yizkor today and three other times during each year?

My response is that while Yizkor is a memorial service, it is really not so much a service of mourning. Mourning may be among the emotions we revisit, but that is not its primary objective.

You can realize that just by its name it's not called avaylut which is the Hebrew word for mourning. This ceremony is called, Yizkor, which means remembering.

We remember our relationships with all of our loved ones, our parents, our siblings, our spouses, our children, our friends, our partners, our teachers, not only because we miss them we remember them, so as to keep alive what we've learned from them, and to demonstrate the new ways we might be able to bring pride to them. We pledge to be careful to avoid the temptations which could lead us to embarrass them.

If Yizkor was really a ceremony mostly about mourning, it would not be held on the joyous holidays of Passover, Shavuot, and two weeks from now on Shemini Atzeret, at the conclusion of Sukkot - our most joyous holiday.

I have always believed that much more than being a ceremony of mourning the loss of a relationship, Yizkor is a ceremony that helps us continue that relationship.

And you might say, Rabbi, don't we recite the mourner's Kaddish at the end of Yizkor and I would say, yes, we do, and that might even help prove my point.

The Kaddish prayer in any of its forms, including the Mourner's Kaddish, does not mention death. It is not about death.

The funeral is about death. Burial is about death. The ceremony of kriah, of tearing a garment and saying the blessing "Baruch atah Adonai…dayan ha-emet (translate) as …

the ultimate judge."

All of that is about death.

Mourner's Kaddish is not recited until after the burial takes place.

Mourner's Kaddish is not about death, it is about the transition to life after the death of someone we love.

Reciting Mourner's Kaddish for almost a year after a parent's death helps you recognize the impact of that loved one on your life in ways that were not discernible despite all you shared, despite all you did, despite all your love for the loved one while that person was alive.

You can never fully know the extent of your relationship with your loved one, until that person dies and your life has changed.

I would like to read story called "Loss/Lost in Translation" by Diane Arieff, a writer out of Los Angeles. It describes a young woman appropriately mourning the loss of her mother who attempts to use a chance encounter with a teenager as a lesson about life and death.

I stood at the checkout counter at Whole Foods, observing the teenaged cashier who was ringing me up. Her forearms were tattooed from wrist to elbow, heavy with ink like pages from a comic book. She wore rings on her thumbs and was pierced in all the standard places. The low-slung jeans she wore exposed a stomach still soft with baby fat. I was only in my late thirties, but I might as well have been observing her from an alternate universe, light years away. When her cell phone went off, she fished it out of her back pocket and held it to her mouth, still scanning my groceries and sliding them down the conveyor belt while she talked, not missing a beat. Her side of the conversation went like this:

"What do you want?"

(pause)

"Mom, what do you WANT?"

(pause)

"I told you not to call me at work."

(eye rolling)

"I don't care. Don't call me at work."

(pause)

"Mom, just stop bugging me, ok? I'm fine."

(pause)

"I'm not sure when I'll be home."

(eye rolling)

"Because you bug me. Omygod, just leave me alone."

(loud sigh)

"Look, I have to go. I have to GO. Don't call me!"

It was painful enough to make me wince. My own mother had died just the year before. There were still times I found myself reaching for the phone to call her. Near the end, in one of those suspended hours of time we spent alone together, she squeezed my hand and said, almost sternly, and "We don't have any unfinished business. I know how much you love me."

Her death was still fresh. It had left me feeling skinless and unprotected. One afternoon, when I came across the word "motherless" in a book, I was startled, as if someone had shouted my name.

In one of her published letters, Edna St. Vincent Millay wrote, "Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world." Yes, I thought. Exactly. I carried her lines around with me for months.

Grief, I came to understand, is like a fierce initiation rite for the heart. Standing there at the market, I watched the GothPunk girl click off her cell phone and shake her head in irritation. It's possible her mother was uniquely monstrous, but somehow, I doubted it.

She handed me my receipt, uninterested in eye contact. Something welled up inside of me and I stayed where I was, hesitant but determined to step outside the bounds of our transaction.

"Look," I said softly as I tucked my wallet into my purse. My voice shook. "Don't be too hard on your mother if you can help it. She won't be around forever." A look of surprise flickered across her face, probably because of the audacity of such a thing, this woman she didn't even know, this loopy customer. She shrugged, annoyed with me but playing it cool, and turned back toward the register.

In the parking lot, as I loaded the grocery bags into my trunk, I wondered if I should have held my tongue. I meant to give her some simple but important thing, a small existential ‘heads up." But really, why should this prickly teenaged girl with a tongue stud have listened to me? I was speaking a language she had no use for yet. From where I stood, on my side of the divide, the message I was sending seemed painfully clear, but it was lost in translation.

Maybe that was how it should be. In a perfect world of answered prayers, no children would ever be on intimate terms with despair. All teenagers would regard mortality and death as distant abstractions, like global warming or the stock exchange.

She should have been kinder to her mother, true. But not for the reasons I gave her. Those she would come to later, in her own time, with her own losses, the way Edna and I had in ours.

I hope and pray that when the time comes for the young girl in the story to mourn her mother, she will take the time to do so appropriately.

Diane Arieff was smart enough to realize that the need to hold a conversation with this young woman would help Diane, much more than it might ever have helped her. Diane is doing what she needs to do in order to help mourning come to an end.

Yizkor, on the other hand, helps to keep alive the memories of our loved ones, forever, and in that way, our relationships with them continue just as we say in that beautiful reading found in our Yizkor book

"As long as we live, they too will live;

For they are now a part of us, as we remember them."

T'hay - May their souls be bound up in the bonds of our lives, and eternal life, and let us say, Amen.