Hello all, and welcome to Havdalah #59 —

Even with everything that’s happening, I hope those of you who celebrate had a good spooky season, Halloween, and last day before daylight savings time. I am apparently the only person I know who likes it when it’s dark in the morning, so despite the extra hour of sleep the time change always annoys me. C’est la vie.

Fall has settled in, and with it, colder weather. While certainly to my preference, it makes life harder for those on the edge, not helped by the cessation of SNAP benefits. If you can, set some money aside for food banks, the unhoused, and feed the heat on programs.

This month we’ve got some events from the ACLU, and a class from from PSL, as well as a new mutual aid for PrYSM. And finally, in honor of the holiday, we’re rerunning one of our very first Sidebars.

Goodnight, and mind how you go —

Katherine (she / her)

PS: We’d like to hear from you! Let us know how we’re doing!

ACLU Foundation of RI Annual Meeting

• When: Thursday, November 6, 6:00pm

• Where: The Guild, 461 Main Street, Pawtucket, RI 02860

• Connect with fellow advocates, community members, and supporters as ACLU RI reflects on the past year, honors Rhode Islanders who have stood strong for civil liberties, and looks ahead to the challenges before us.

• Tickets are $25, and a drink ticket and variety of appetizers included. Open to members and non-members alike.

• ACLU Annual Meeting Event and Ticket Link

Workers and Renters: Providence General Assembly

• When: Saturday, November 8, 12:00pm and every other Saturday

• Where: 134 Mathewson Street, Providence, RI 02903

• From their Instagram:

  • Worried about Trump?

  • Want to defend our communities?

  • Want a world that works for everyone?

  • Come to the Providence General Assembly!

• Spanish, ASL interpretation and childcare available upon email request

• Masking requested and masks will be provided

• Direct questions to [email protected]

• Providence General Assembly

• Workers and Renters Website

The Womxn Project Call to Actions

• Not quite an event, but the Womxn Project has provided a couple of actions to do to respond to the health and food crisis in Rhode Island:

• Call to Action #1: Help Your Neighbor! Let’s build food security for our community into our daily actions!

  • With the expanding food crisis, The Womxn Project, in partnership with the RI Food Bank, RI Food Policy Council, RI State Council of Churches, and Youth Pride, is issuing a statewide call to action, STAT!

  • Every nonprofit organization or for-profit business—from sports teams and scouting troops to art collectives and faith communities—is being asked to include a food collection at every one of their events.

  • In a recent interview with Rhode Island Public Radio, RI Food Bank Executive Director Melissa Cherney reported that nearly 40% of Rhode Islanders are experiencing food insecurity. “RI has many committed non-profit organizations. That means we have the reach and the power to make an enormous difference if we act together. This is how we show what community care really looks like.”  Jocelyn Foye, Executive Director of The Womxn Project.

  • As the smallest state in the nation, Rhode Island can prove it’s also the biggest in heart. This initiative—called “Big Table Rhode Island!”—urges organizations to normalize giving by encouraging attendees to bring canned or nonperishable goods to every meeting, practice, or event, creating a culture of consistent, everyday support for local pantries. Read more

  • Read the 3 Ways to Get Involved 

  • Sign the pledge and start today!

• Call to Action #2: Voting Transparency: The Bodily Freedom Forever Index Questionnaires are out!

  • This past week, the Womxn Project sent the Bodily Freedom Forever Index questionnaire to every elected official in our state, from town and city school committee or town counselors, to state reps and senators on up.

  • Through civic engagement, policy advancement, and artivism, TWP takes action to secure reproductive freedom, LGBTQ+ rights, and government transparency in Rhode Island. The BFFI is an ongoing initiative to record and report the stance of each elected official in RI on these issues to promote transparency in our elections.  

  • TWP defines "bodily freedom" as sole decision-making power over one's body, so long as those decisions do not infringe on another’s bodily autonomy.  When evaluating an official's stance on bodily freedom, TWP considers two (of many) issues: support for reproductive rights and support for LGBTQ+ equality.

  • HELP TWP get a response from your local elected officials -- have them fill out the BFFI survey sent to their emails!

• Call to Action #3: Our Rhode Island "Kavanaugh" Problem: An Anti-Democratic Nominee for Judge

  • Earlier this summer the chair of the RI Judicial Nominating Commission (JNC) stated TWP broke precedent for the amount of emails and oral testimony shared against one candidate seeking a district judge position.

  • Why? Michael McCaffrey is an anti-abortion, anti-marriage equality candidate with the separation of church and state being of no concern. After the JNC voted on him and others, they passed the recommendations on to the Governor who "taps" a few candidates, to then go to the RI Senate for a final vote.

  • Since the vote, 3 new district judges have retired making it so there are FOUR positions to fill. All the calls and attention to this from the summer is not lost.

  • We need to call our Senators and say NO to a representative that is not aligned to the majority of RI's values. Remember, there are FIVE names that were passed onto the Governor. Join us in saying no to McCaffrey-"Kavanaugh." Say yes to the four others!

ACLU Rights Explainers

• When: Up now

• Where: Online

• The ACLU just released two updated versions of their explainers about your rights when interacting with immigration agents (ICE) or the police. They have them available in 10 languages: English, Spanish, Portuguese, Cape Verdean, Haitian Creole, French, Swahili, Dari, Pashto, and Khmer.

• Read and save this material – regardless of your own immigration status – and send to friends and family! Click the link below and scroll to the bottom of the page to download PDFs that you can print, plus the ACLU posted on all their social media platforms (@riaclu) if you want to save and share online.

• If you have a specific way to distribute larger numbers of the paper copies, please email the RI ACLU at [email protected] or call them at 401-831-7171. They have a limited supply printed, but will provide as many as they are able.

• ACLU Rights Explainers

PSL Online Course: Let Them Tremble

• When: Tuesdays and Thursdays, November 4-20, 6:30pm-8:30pm EST

• Where: Hybrid online and in person at The People’s Forum, 320 W 37th Street, New York, NY 10018

• This course delves into the history and lessons of the labor movement, and examines why the power of the organized working class has always been central to every progressive transformation in the United States. Together, the class will explore how we can take these lessons and build a bold, fighting labor movement today — one that not only defends our rights but goes on the offensive to win a world organized to meet the needs of the many, not just the few.

• If you are joining virtually, a zoom link will be sent prior to each class.

• If you aren’t able to join classes live, all course materials (including class recordings, readings, and additional materials) will be uploaded to the student portal so you can follow the course at your own pace.

• Registration for PSL Course

Support PrYSM's Defense Fund

📢 Our Southeast Asian communities are under attack — help PrYSM fight back! 📢

Providence Youth Student Movement (PrYSM) is supporting over 70 Southeast Asian refugees with deportation orders. They provide organizing, legal, and community resources for their members and their families to fight against the US deportation machine.

With your support, PrYSM can continue to:

1. provide rapid response for community members detained and facing immediate deportation

2. provide mutual aid for legal fees and services

3. support impacted members and their families during ICE check ins and court hearings

4. provide case management for current and new members with orders of deportation

Donate today to help support the Southeast Asian community!

PrYSM Defense Fund Page

News Round-Up: Local

Asylum-seeker arrested in R.I., fears death if deported by ICE (Yvonne Abraham in The Boston Globe, October 27, 2025)

New England educators and students brace for ICE raids (Shruti Rajkumar in PRISM, October 28, 2025)

Providence teen detained by ICE for months appears in R.I. court (Yvonne Abraham in The Boston Globe, October 28, 2025)

Rhode Island prepares for a hungry world without SNAP (Steve Ahlquist in SteveAhlquist.news, October 28, 2025)

Mayor Smiley talks about the housing crisis, his opposition to rent control, and the potential loss of SNAP (Steve Ahlquist in SteveAhlquist.news, October 28, 2025)

Attorneys general coalition sues the Trump Administration for illegally suspending SNAP benefits (Steve Ahlquist in SteveAhlquist.news, October 28, 2025)

Political, religious, and community leaders question the handling of the Smithfield antisemitic hazing incident (Steve Ahlquist in SteveAhlquist.news, October 31, 2025)

News Round-Up: National

Details of DHS Agreement Reveal Risks of Trump Administration’s Use of Social Security Data for Voter Citizenship Checks (Jen Fifield in ProPublica, October 30, 2025)

Pod Recs: It Could Happen Here

Executive Disorder: White House Weekly #39 (It Could Happen Here, October 31, 2025)

(Note: this Sidebar originally ran in Havdalah #4, here)

Katherine (she / her)

The end of October, the beginning of November, always feels odd to me — and not just because of the time change. It starts a ticking clock in my brain, the halting transition from Ordinary Time to the great feasts of Catholicism, and it begins with Allhallowtide.

Allhallowtide — October 31 to November 2 — is a deeply unbalanced three day triduum in the Catholic calendar, one day eaten by candy and costume, another folded away into nearly nothing. It is a time to remember the saints, the martyrs, all the faithful dead.

October 31, All Hallows’ Eve, starts the three day observance, and going from the commercial Saturnalia of Halloween the night before to the austere service the next day gives one a sort of theological hangover as well as a sugar crash.

All Saints’ Day follows, and it is a commemoration of all of the known and unknown saints of the Church. Saints, in Catholic parlance, being those already in heaven, as opposed to Purgatory. Or elsewhere. It’s an old feast, from when the tradition of honoring the martyrs under Rome ran into the problem of too many dead and not enough days (for martyrs, you see, go straight to the top, fast pass). The solution was to have them all celebrated on one day of the year. 

The last day of Allhallowtide is All Souls’ Day — The Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed — the ones who didn’t die for the faith, who weren’t saints, regular Joes and Janes who have to work out their unfinished business of unshriven sin via Purgatorial therapy. In short, myself and everyone else I’m likely to meet. It gives the day a slightly awkward sort of sadness. That'll be us soon enough; on a long enough time scale we're all dead men walking. As the tombstone says — as you are now, so once was I. As I am now, so you will be.

The triduum has a homely sort of grief about it, comforting and comfortable in turn, more of the familiarity of the poppy than the Passion. Of the three, only All Saints is a holy day of obligation (the American bishops know how many times they can try and compel their congregations into the pews on an off day and expect to be listened to; they ration them. Lord, we’re spoiled), and so it does a rough double duty for its sister day, All Souls. Perhaps because of this, I’ve always found that All Souls echoes oddly in my head; honored in the breach, a memorial to our unnumbered dead that we hope ended up on the right side of Hell, but with no way of knowing outside the bounds of the undiscovered country. Like throwing pebbles down a well, without a splash, and only the assumption that at the bottom there’s water.

An oddity of the calendar, from which we can see the beginning of Advent, a strange moment of quiet stillness in the beginning of the secular downslide into the overwhelming, cacophonous, Halloween Thanksgiving-ChristmasNewYearWhatareyougettingwhereareyougoinghappyholidaysTheMostWonderfulTimeoftheYear — the last deep breath in before the plunge.

Take a moment: inhale; exhale. 

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. 

Requiescat in pace. 

Needle Drop: “Oh Death”, Noah Gundersen