RJ Blog

by Rabbi Heath Watenmaker If you’re reading this article there is a good chance you belong to a Reform synagogue. Have you ever thought about what that means? Why do you belong to a Reform synagogue? Why are you a Reform Jew? What makes you a Reform Jew? Now, think about your children or grandchildren. Have you explained why you belong to the Reform movement? Have you talked about the Jewish choices that you have made in your life? Have you talked to them about what it means to be a Reform Jew? As the Reform Outreach Initiative Rabbi at [...]

I was on the phone a few months ago with Marshall Einhorn, executive director of Brown-RISD Hillel, discussing a talk I was asked to give at Brown, where my younger son is currently a junior and of which my older son is an alumnus. As an aside, I asked Marshall who would be leading the campus Reform services for the High Holy Days. When he said he had asked a number of people but without success, I offered to help. “That would be great!” Marshall said. “Let me know if your networks surface someone interested.” “No,” I told him. “Maybe [...]

By Jason Levine “Rabbi Hanina taught: ‘I have learned much from my teachers, more from my colleagues, but from my students I have learned most of all.’” A few days ago, I had the honor of serving as a staff member for a group of 40 college students from the Hillel Foundation at Miami University and UConn Hillel on a whirlwind 10-day journey with Taglit-Birthright Israel. While the students had a tremendous time, I want to assure them and all others that they taught me far more than they realize. “May it be your will, our God and God of [...]

by Missy Goldstein Last fall, as a junior attending the University of Florida (UF), I was considering all the possibilities for the upcoming spring break.   I know that typical UF students spend their spring breaks on cruises and at beaches, drinking and getting awkward tanlines.  I was not excited by the prospect of getting sunburned or putting myself in a bathing suit.  Sure I could visit my parents in Texas, but since it was a recent relocation, there would be no friends there for me and sitting on the couch all week just sounded boring. I thought about my Jewish [...]

by Linda K. WertheimerOriginally posted on Jewish Muse Elena Kagan is giving me a guilt trip, but it has nothing to do with her nomination for the US Supreme Court. At age 12, Kagan fought for the right to chant from the Torah in her Orthodox shul to celebrate her coming of age as a bat mitzvah. In 2006, at age 41, I chanted from the Torah and led a prayer service to celebrate my bat mitzvah as an adult. I am chagrined as I write this: I have never chanted from the Torah again. Kagan’s long-ago fight for equality [...]

By JanetheWriterLast Friday evening, my longtime friend, Jeanne, arrived at Penn Station for an overnight visit with me. Before we could poke around in SoHo, though, or begin to catch up on each other’s lives, we headed uptown for Shabbat dinner with her son, Jeremy, a rabbinical student at the Jewish Theological Seminary. Along the way, Jeanne told me that JTS students are required to be shomer shabbos. Before we entered the building on Broadway, therefore, I shut off my cell phone. Once inside, we climbed two flights to Jeremy’s living space and, after a quick tour, climbed an additional [...]

By dccMy first job in high school was as a data entry clerk for the Los Angeles Jewish Federation’s Israel Experience Program where I built an extremely tacky website that was thankfully edited within a few days of my departure. I served as cook, programmer and student development coordinator at Hillel, a youth group director in Sacramento, CA, a religious school teacher in Davis, CA and New York City, a counselor and unit head at summer camps in California and Texas, a legislative assistant for the RAC (rac.org) and finally as the Communications Manager for the Union. My identity has been [...]