There are Jews in Kentucky?

Tisha B'Av

2006-07-30T10:19:00.000-04:00

Right now, the Jewish world is in a period of time called the Three Weeks of Calamity (or Shalosh Shabbatot d'Puranuta), which is the span of time between the Seventeenth of Tammuz and the Ninth of Av. On the Seventeenth of Tammuz, a number of horrible events happened to the Jewish people, but most notable the walls of Jerusalem were breached in 586 leading up to the Ninth of Av which sees the Temple destroyed. All of the events that fall on these dates are ones that shake up the Jewish people, causing feelings of grief, terror and loss of focus.

And watching the news for the past two weeks has given most of the Jewish people around the world those same feelings, especially as we watch world opinion turn on Israel.

Yesterday was a special Shabbat called Shabbat Hazon, which is the final Shabbat before Tisha B'Av. On that Shabbat we read the first prophecy of the prophet Isaiah ben Amotz. I have read this before in synagogue for the past several years. Since this portion of the prophets is read with two different cantillation systems, I am usually worried about the transitions from one to the next and back.

This Shabbat Hazon was completely different. I began just fine, but when I came to the phrase "The cities are burning with fire" I began weeping and sobbing. I had never before lived though a Three Weeks where the emotions of the world I lived in were in line with the emotions in the synagogue ritual. All of my stress, worry and anxiety about what is happening in Israel came gushing out. It was almost impossible to continue, my voice kept breaking.

I just hope that the end result of what happened in Isaiah's day does not come to pass in ours.

Catching up

2006-07-02T08:16:00.000-04:00

About a month ago, I was in Cincinnati as a chaperone with five members of my youth group on a trip to King's Island. While they were all at local host homes for the night, I was the guest of the synagogue and stayed overnight in their guest room (nicely appointed by IKEA). It's good to simply be there without having to be on for anyone, especially the night before a long day. Another benefit is that I get to be right on time for this congregation's morning minyan, which is quite good. Whenever I have stayed over at this synagogue, I have been at their morning minyan.

First of all, this synagogue just finished phase two of a major renovation, and the building is stunning, including the chapel where morning minyan is held. The chapel has beautiful padded wooden seats, contemporary cut glass windows (one for each Jewish holiday) and an ark of wood that covers the entire east wall. The minyan itself is well attended, participatory and has high standards for the quality of the davenning that goes on in there.

What caught my eye that particular morning was an elderly gentleman who was leading the morning service. His accent was Yiddish-esque, pronounced both Tav and Sav, and sounded like he learned to daven in the Old World. When it came time to repeat the Amidah, the central Jewish prayer, he began to chant: "...Elohei Avraham, Elohei Yitzchak, Elohei Yaakov..." No surprises yet. This is how every Amidah has begun for about two thousand years with each Patriarch being listed out separately. For two thousand years, the prayer continues on "Ha'el Hagadol Hagibor El Elyon...", but in many modern prayer books, a historical, theological and gender gap has been filled in with a similar list of the Four Matriarchs. He continued, "Elohei Sarah, Elohei Rivka, Elohei Leah, vElohei Rachel."

This gentleman, who sounded and look Old World, was davenning the central Jewish prayer with a modern addition! The idea in my mind is that most people his age simply won't do that because it is not how it has been done...ever. I admit, I did not have the chance to ask him about how he came to say this version of the Amidah. It may simply be that this is how the synagogue does it all the time and he does as his rabbi requires. But then he does not have to lead services! So on some level, he accepts the change. Perhaps, he understands the importance of the change. The need to include women's voices both in our past and in our present. True that this is also a large egalitarian synagogue in Cincinnati, which is a center of liberal Jewish thought for over one hundred and fifty years. But he probably came to America in one of the early 20th Century waves of immigration that found Conservative Judaism a good religious fit.

Whatever the reason, I have seen that some people of his generation are catching up to mine. And it gives me confidence that innovation is sometimes coupled with reason that transcends generation.

Going Back (My Way)

2006-06-26T21:48:00.000-04:00

For some reason, my family and I are driving from Louisville, KY to Edison, NJ and beyond over the next two days. So being a child of the Information Age, I use Google Maps to find my way across America. Just so happens that we have decided to stop in Bedford, PA for tomorrow night's lodging. Google Maps, in an apparent fit of concealed wisdom, has added a one hour detour to its route for us. MapQuest seems to have no problem sending me through what may be dangerous territory. So against better judgment, I will use MapQuest for part of my journey tomorrow.

But here is the thing - I pick and choose based on what I wish to believe. What strikes me about this is how this simply choice mirrors the way the American Jews pick and choose today. In Steve Cohen and Arnold Eisen's book "The Jew Within", they identify a trend in the way that moderately affiliated Jews behave, namely that the self is the Sovereign that guides them as they live their Jewish lives. The choose what they do today for personal reasons, and may choose tomorrow to do the same or to do differently, based on changing circumstances or moods.

Recently, I was visited by an acquaintance from another Midwestern city. He was debating on coming to Louisville for Shavuot (The Feast of Weeks) for the all night learning session or coming the next day before Shabbat (which would make him fly on a Yom Tov, a day when observant Jews do not normally fly). In addition, this person who was into the all night learning that night, and keeps Shabbat, was picked up for a pre-wedding gathering on Shabbat afternoon. He admitted to us that he keeps Shabbat, but weddings are a time when he finds himself breaking Shabbat.

I mention this not to criticize but to illustrate the point that this individual, who is a serious and committed Jewish by many standards, still does as he pleases. I think that Cohen and Eisen's idea of the Sovereign Self goes beyond the moderately affiliated. In American, all Jews are in some sense Jews by choice. What we do, we do because we choose to do so, not because we are commanded. Perhaps, even those who feel commanded, choose to feel commanded.

The Rabbis debate which is better: to do when commanded or to do when not commanded. In American thinking, where individual freedom is valued very highly, people would probably say that it is better to do when not commanded. But the Rabbis see it another way: To do something when asked by someone else is a higher level of doing. In other words, doing the commandments for the Rabbis is all about being in relationship with God and acting out of loyalty to that relationship, which is called "commandedness." I wonder for how many Jews today their "doing of the commandments" stems from their relationship with God? Perhaps it does not matter. in the doing, for whatever reason, people catch a glimpse of the divine, a spark of holiness in their lives. Perhaps they will catch on fire (in a metaphorical sense) and their relationship to the Divine will grow, increasing their sense of commandedness as they seek out that feeling, that sense of the Holy once again.

That would be a real going back to the beginning, where everything began. Not the East Coast, but to the Root of All, the One.

The Sukkah Project

2005-10-17T10:23:00.000-04:00

The Sukkah Project

Four years ago, I learned about this company from my synagogue. They provide easy-to-use materials for building quality, durable sukkot. They can provide directions, materials and a lumber list for wooden sukkot, PVC sukkah kits, bamboo mats for skhakh, great tarp walls, beautiful contemporary decorations, and even plastic fruits and vegetables. You can even order your lulav and etrog from them. So next year, build a sukkah!

Interfaith Dialogue in Home Depot (Erev Sukkot)

2005-10-17T09:59:00.000-04:00

Tonight begins the festival of Sukkot, during which many Jews spend as much time as possible (mainly meals) in a sukkah, a small wooden hut that they build in their yard. Not that I want to promote stereotypes, but Sukkot is one of the few times a year that I use powertools. In fact all of my serious tools have been purchases related to building our sukkah. So yesterday, it was natural that I made a short trip to our local Home Depot for a couple of sukkot related purchases: some dowels for a sukkah banner, a new light buld for our deck to provide light for the sukkah and screening material so that someone in the kitchen can hear someone in the sukkah.

I secured the bulb and dowels easily without any help from the staff. The screen had me a little lost. The first person I turn to is happy to walk me to the screen area to find the screen guy. Surely he noticed by light grey leather kippah with two shiny silver clips keeping it one my head. And the knit purple and white kippah with pink clips on my daughter's head. As we are walking, he quietly says to me, "It's nice to see a person of faith in the store."

In my head, all kinds of alarms go off, possible responses, the myriad ways that my faith and his differ on so many points. And I nod my head and say, "Thank you." Not worth getting into any deeper discussion than that. This is after all Home Depot, not an interfaith dialogue. But how interesting this man's view of his work life might be. Does it seem to him that so much of the world is secular? Do his customers seem particularly profane? Do few overtly devout people fix up their homes with help from Home Depot. I'm not sure, but I am sure that the kippot were the big give away. The comforting thing is that the remark was positive in that we both share a strong connection to our respective religion. Maybe we could have had a dialog on some religious values that we both hold dear.

So he walks me to the screen guy, who shows me (to my chagrin) how to fix the screen with some screen materials and a nifty new tools called a spliner or something like that. As we are walking away together, my fix-it materials in hand, he asks me (again the kippah must be the tip off), "I see you are wearing one of those things on your head. I have seen a lot of people wearing those today. Why today?"

After my short explanation about sukkot, its agricultural and historical significance, I explain that one of the main things on Sukkot is to build a "sukkah." The thing that I realized is that he had seen several people yesterday purchasing various supplies for a mysterious light building project, but had not gone up to them to ask. Maybe I was the guy with the thing on his head that was the tipping point for his curiosity. Part of me thinks that it may be that I was the most "normal" looking person with the thing on his head. Some of the other people he saw no doubt were from our local Lubavitch/Orthodox community. Maybe he found them a tad intimidating. Maybe I was the only one that was looking for some screen material.

But it just goes to show you: wearing that thing, that kippah on my head brings people to talk to me about myself, Judaism, to share with me matters of faith, even if just to share that we each have a strong connection to one. And since Sukkot is a festival with universalist themes, it is appropriate that preparing for it made the world a little smaller and a little closer together.

Minyan

2005-10-16T22:15:00.000-04:00

This is my week to cover evening minyans at our synagogue. There are several regulars, who usually come on Sunday evenings to help make sure that we have ten people, enough for a full prayer service and so that mourners have a chance to say Kaddish, a prayer that proclaims God's holiness (despite the recent death of a member of the family). Tonight I saw a congregation whose husband has just died, along with her daughter, son-in-law and their two daughters. They are not part of the regular crowd. So together, we have four adults. Nowhere near ten. Then a regular arrives. Then two more. Now we are at seven. I begin to make calls. I call one and then another person who has offered their time to come almost no matter what. They don't even miss a beat. Once off the phone, they must grab the keys and go. There is no other way to explain how fast they arrive. Two other arrive, and we have ten. Once again, God's holy name is glorified, and it took some doing, but we did it. Such is the life of a minyan in Kentucky.

Can a leopard change his spots? Does he have to?!

2005-09-01T23:22:00.000-04:00

About two months ago, I received a phone call at the JCC. I push the button that lights up when my line gets a call: "Melton Mini-School, how may I help you?" And the voice on the other end is not the typical voice that I hear on the other end of a call to the JCC. This young man was calling me from jail with a bible in his hand, reading various passages from the Prophets, especially Jeremiah, Isaiah and Daniel. I can't give a verbatim of our conversation, but in short it contained all of the following information.

1. Dareen had been in jail for a week because of an assault and battery charge. He implied that this was his first offense and would probably be home in a week or so.
2. He had just found out a few weeks before that that his maternal grandfather was Jewish.
3. He knows certain passages of the Hebrew Bible really well, and tends to think of them literally.
4. He is African-American and is considering converting to Judaism.

The question of his that lingers with me every day is based on a passage in Jeremiah where the prophet asks if an Ethiopian can change his skin or a leopard his spots. Dareen asked me if he had to change the color of his skin in order to become Jewish. Saddened and angered I insisted that in no way did anyone need to change their skin color in order to join the Jewish people. Did he know that over 90,000 Ethiopian Jews are living in Israel and Ethiopia today? Did he have any idea that there is no such thing as a Jewish skin tone! The subtle innocent racism struck a chord: he must be only one of many people who still think as all Jewish as a white subgroup tracing back to the ancient middle east. Dareen naive eugenics threw me back to World War II Germany as I considered what kind of a process he was thinking of.

But next is Dareen obsession with acquiring wisdom. Passage after passage about wisdom and fearing God and loving God and on and on. But only a small set of texts. Dareen seemed intent on pursuing wisdom and submitting to God. He was fixated on one passage that talks about eating butter and honey as a way to acquire wisdom. What I heard as allegory and metaphor he saw as a recipe for wisdom.

In the following weeks, Dareen has called me three or four times, still in jail. Our last conversation on Tuesday began right where our last one had left off. Since we had last spoken, I called Jewish Family and Vocational Services to get a handle on how to approach his should he get out of jail and pay me a visit. They gave me some great advice on working with Dareen.

He still wants to convert. So I gave him some homework. I told him that he needs to read more of the Hebrew Bible. I asked Dareen to reread from Genesis through II Kings and to be aware that he descends from the stock of Abraham, that this is his story. And that when he gets out of jail and is in an apartment that he can see himself in for a year or more, he can call me and we can talk about where he might go to work on conversion.

Would any of my colleagues work with him? Will he ever get to this place? Is he serious or stuck in jail with too much time on his hands, trying to figure out what it means to have one Jewish grandparent? I'll let you know later when he calls.

Cathedral Heritage Foundation

2005-08-22T22:56:00.000-04:00

Cathedral Heritage Foundation

One of the shining gems in Louisville's faith communities is the Cathedral Heritage Foundation. There are few organizations that can truly claim to be "interfaith" and CHF does it, almost to the point of being criticized for going too far. They push the envelope of interfaith dialogue. Check out their Festival of Faiths! Stunning. This morning I spent two hours talking to Landon from CHF, and we learned that we have much in common, much to teach each other and more to learn from one another. I hope that this is the beginning of a long lasting friendship, and that it can be a bridge between our two faith communities.

As the new year approaches...

2005-08-22T22:30:00.000-04:00

Now is the time after summer has ended and before the year gets underway. Like a huge intake of breath before the exhale, which will not come for two months, after Sukkot. I thought that I got rid of some of the hats I wear, but it seems I was unsuccessful. It seems that I wear as many hats as ever. And some of these hats get in each other's way.

As I settle into this community, I realize how entangled things are and see how innocent words or gestures set people off. This is a small Jewish community, and every piece of it is connected. When one piece moves, all the others feel it. Some more than others. I can appreciate why some groups in town prefer to do their own thing. Fewer repercussions to handle. Being part of the more intertwined community simple brings more players to bear on any given project. Working for one organization can subtly and significantly disturb other pieces.

I walk some precarious lines in this town, and this past summer has taught me that fact more than anything else. But this is also the beginning of my fourth year here. People are getting to know me. I have some successes in my past, and I am ready to face tomorrow. I know who are my allies, who is willing to stand with me and work with me. And sadly, I know better now who will not. Some things are bigger than me, which is as it should be.

It is not about me. It's about the kids, the Hebrew language, the synagogue, the culture around me, the families and their needs. The trick is not to lose myself. And that really is the rub in all this. Some time it feels like people expect you to take care of themselves to the exclusion of yourself and your own family. What they do not realize is that this expectation is destructive. It diminishes everyone involved. And feeling that need from others is seductive, and can even make you turn your mind from your own family, your own needs for a while. And no matter which choice you make, the other pieces of the community feel the choice, feel the change in the system. It is more a matter of how much dissonance the system can handle before breaking or replacing the piece that causes the dissonance.

Sometimes it is exciting to do something that makes the community move and dance. Think of a windchime, and how a gentle breeze pushes the pieces so that they come make music. Disturbances to the system actually make the system seem beautiful. Too much wind and the whole thing come crashing down.

So this year, I will try to be a gentle breeze. Wish me luck.

Ritualwell.org - Ceremonies for Jewish Living

2005-07-17T23:52:00.000-04:00

Ritualwell.org - Ceremonies for Jewish Living

Speaking of Brit Mikvah, ritualwell.org is a great website for renewing traditional Jewish rituals and for developing new ones. They really helped us develop our Brit Mikvah ceremony, to which we owe thanks for Rabbi Michael and Sharon Strassfeld, who first developed the core of what we use today.

Ein Sof

2005-07-17T23:16:00.001-04:00

Sometime there are events that come together, and you cannot shake the sense that all things are indeed connected. This past weekend, I had the honor of witnessing in one family both the honoring of a father and the welcoming of his son's baby girl into the Sinai covenant.

My friend Kevin's father died eleven months ago. For those of you who do not know, it is incumbent upon a person's children to attend daily prayer services (minyan) and recite what is known as the Mourner's Kaddish, a doxology which praises God even in the face of death. Did I mention that the requirement is to do so for eleven months? Most people nowadays do not make it all the way. Kevin did. Yesterday afternoon, Kevin came to minyan for the final time to say Kaddish for his dad Morty.

In the past year, Kevin and his wife Robin also had a baby girl, their seventh child. They are good friends of ours. In the past few weeks, we have been a sounding board for their search for both the baby's Hebrew and English names. Another wonderful point of convergence is that Kevin and Robin are also members of the synagogue that just hired me to be its Assistant Rabbi.

So this past Friday morning, Kevin, Robin and I are sitting in my office talking about the Hebrew name. We look up the birthdate and determine what the Torah portion was the week she was born. It was Korach, which is about a series of rebellions that take place against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. I scan through the chapters, looking for names that are not applied to villains. Then I come across the scene where the chiefs of eleven other tribes challenge Aaron and the Levites's leadership. God commands each chief to place his staff, including Aaron, inside the Holy of Holies overnight. In the morning, Aaron's staff alone has blossomed with almond blossoms.

Did I mention that Kevin's father's Hebrew name was Mendel, which means 'almond'? And in this same section the verb for blossoming appears twice, which also has the same root as the name Nitza, meaning blossom, in this case an almond blossom. Coincidentally, this name has been one of their top choices for a while. Can you get any better than that!?

So today, I had the privilege of helping bring Nitza into the Sinai covenant through the ritual of Brit Mikvah, which means bringing a baby girl into the Sinai covenant through ritual immersion. The day after Kevin completed saying goodbye for Morty his father, also named Mendel, we welcomed Nitzah, meaning almond blossom, into our community.

It took me back to a day in February in 2004 when we brought our daughter Aviyah into the covenant the day after Alan, Paula's father was buried. We welcomed Aviyah into our family in the midst of saying goodbye to Alan.

Nitza and Morty are joined like two roads end to end. Alan and Aviyah are more like two roads that intertwine and intersect. Time gave Kevin's family more time to honor his father without distraction. The joy of Aviyah was tempered for eleven months with the sounds of Paula saying Kaddish for Alan. But that too passed. The roads did eventually separate.

But man, raising kids is still damn tough.

Ein Sof

2005-07-17T23:16:00.000-04:00

Preople - Its about who you are...

2005-06-09T23:42:00.000-04:00

Preople - Its about who you are...

This is kind of a funny website. It lets you see how you rank in terms of digital-virtual fame. For people both fictional and nonfictional. My ranking tanked. But then, when I looked up my name from before I was married, there was a better score. What can one do? So I signed up. It's....interesting.

Another step in the evolution of my role in Louisville

2005-06-08T21:48:00.000-04:00

Now that a letter has gone out to the entire congregation of Keneseth Israel, I can add this to my blog: As of July 1st, I will be Keneseth Israel's first Assistant Rabbi of Youth and Education. This is the first time that Keneseth Israel has someone in the clergy team devoted to serving the youth and educational programming of the synagogue. This is also my opportunity to experience working fully in a synagogue setting, which is where these past three years have lead me.

I will also remain as the Director of the Florence Melton Adult Mini-School at the JCC of Louisville.

So I will still have two jobs, and at least two masters! Oh well!

Sam Glaser: A Man Who Is Generous With His Time

2005-06-08T21:39:00.000-04:00

Last weekend, 25 Jewish kids from Kentucky got together for a weekend retreat, at the center of which was our artist-in-residence Sam Glaser (www.samglaser.com). First of all, Sam was going to be doing a concert in Lexington on the Sunday evening after the weekend retreat ended, which is how we had secured Sam for half of his normal fee. Despite the concert falling through, Sam was still coming out for the weekend. How awesome is that!

We had asked Sam to lead Friday night services, teach after dinner, teach again on Saturday afternoon and then do a sing-along session after Shabbat on Saturday night. And he went above and beyond that. He participated in the services at one of the two Conservative synagogues on Shabbat morning, he joined us for singing at lunch, he sang at Four Courts, the local Jewish nursing home, for the residents. And the sing-along amounted to a three hour long mini-concert/jam session. The kids and the adults present were all very impressed with Sam's generosity both personal and with his time. When he was not on, he was shmoozing with kids and adults alike.

What a great weekend!

There are Jews in Kentucky?

2005-05-26T01:02:00.000-04:00

Just something cool to mention. I think my role in Jewish life in Louisville, KY might be changing yet again. Stay tuned.

Wrapping up a year, Beginning a new one

2005-05-26T00:31:00.000-04:00

Who might have guessed that I would be moved to tears at the concluding ceremony for a year of adult Jewish study? On one level, Melton is just lots of adults spending two hours each week with big binders filled with class materials learning with local clergy. But on another level, these adults were there for more. These adults took time from their busy schedules each week because they were taking their first steps exploring what being Jewish means to them today in a serious, rigorous way. I did not realize how much I had come to look forward to and appreciate the over fourty adults for whom I made copies, brewed coffee, laid out cookies and did all sorts of little things to make the experience a good one. But laying out these cookies is not just laying out cookies. Making these copies is not just making copies. Every little thing that I do for Melton is furthering the goal of creating a community of caring learners. Learners who are on a journey together.

I cannot say enough how fulfilling my role is at the Melton Mini-School at the JCC of Louisville, KY. This past December at the Melton Director's conference, I told Betsy Dolgin-Katz that this position was the first one that I had where I truly felt that I was fulfilling my mandate as a rabbi. I think that as I move into summer, I can take the feelings from this year and use them as inspiration for making tons of phone calls to people who I think might welcome the same experience as almost everyone who has gone through the Melton Mini-School.

Now I have to go an wrap up my youth group's year. Won't be easy.

The Jewish Way to Enjoy the Kentucky Derby

2005-05-09T21:40:00.000-04:00

Even though the Kentucky Derby us on Saturday, which of course if the Jewish Sabbath, there are ways for Sabbath observant Jews to enjoy the Kentucky Derby. This past weekend, my friend Rabbi Michelle Fisher came in to enjoy such a weekend. Most importantly, we did go to Churchill Downs, because, if you did not already know this, there is a whole other race called the Kentucky Oaks which falls on Friday. True, this is not the major event that is the Derby, but it is still fun. Lots of people, lots of cool derby hats, lots of mint julips and lots of horse races. To fully enjoy the experience, we chose to park on a local resident's property for a mere $20. The we followed the long slow line to get into Churchill Downs, which one of my professors calls one of the most sacred spots in all of American culture. Michelle and I met a college friend of her and her husband to walk around on this near-Derby day. As it turns out, we have some friends in common and were able to find them and crash a company Oaks party. Aside form being able to see some good friends, Michelle was able to enjoy a mint julep without paying $8. One of the really cool parts of being at this party was being right over the turf (grass) track during a turf horse race. The pack of horses swept by right under us. I also should mention that Graeter's Ice Cream was for sale there (kosher too!) I had Bourbon Ball, which contains actual Woodford Reserve Bourbon.

The enjoy the actual Kentucky Derby, we took several steps. First, we left the TV for all of Shabbat just to be able to watch the two most exciting minutes in all of sports. The drawback was that Michelle had to endure an entire night of low level background noise from the TV. She woke up full of Derby information which she had absorbed by osmosis. For Shabbat Dinner, I chose recipies which reflected the Derby-ness of the day: Henry Bain sauce over salmon (supposed to be tenderloin), a vegetarian "burgoo" (supposed to contain meat such as beef, chicken, squirrel or badger, etc.), cucumber dill dip, coconut ambrosia salad, spinach and strawberry salad, mint julep iced tea and more. The finishing touch was Derby Pie, which is essentially sugar, chocolate chips and pecans. Like a large chocolate chip cookie, but in the form of a pie. Our friends Michael, Dana and Michelle all enjoyed our Shabbat derby fare.

At synagogue that day, a few people indeed wore traditional derby hats, which are large and often decorated with flowers and ribbons. My wife Paula, the cantor, concluded with Adon Olam sung to the tune of "My Old Kentucky Home." The kiddush luncheon was elaborate and reflected the secular holiness of the day. In the afternoon, we invited over two good friends to enjoy the race. After more derby oriented food, including more derby pie, we watched the race, which was won by a total longshot horse (51-1 odds). The evening ended long after the race finished, and we did havdalah to usher in the new week.

Did I mention that we also attended some of the other Derby Festival events: the Great Bed Race and the Pegasus Parade. And to top it all off, Louisville enjoyed some of its finest weather in years.

So for all of you who know me and would like to enjoy a Derby Shabbat, just give us a call and let's plan for next year!

Hope For The Future

2005-04-11T12:00:00.000-04:00

Coming home from Detroit yesterday, I could not help but think that there is hope for Jewish life in general and specifically in Kentucky. Youth groups and their directors work hard to create programs that engage and inspire Jewish kids to be with their Jewish friends and to connect to the world as a Jew, to look at the world through Jewish lenses. So after a solid year of working with kids, parents, synagogues, caterers and businesses, it is hard to know how well you did. Were we successful? Did we make a difference? Is the Jewish community stronger know than it was one year ago? It takes a weekend in a hotel removed from the routine of daily life to recognize and appreciate how far we have come in the past year.

DerbyUSY, the youth group that I direct, has had a good year. Our local executive board loves USY and they love and respect each other. We had some good events, lots of meetings, too many emails and not enough phone calls. The events had a high level of quality, but we were not reaching the amount of people that we wanted to impact. But it was a good year.

Sometimes it takes the recognition of others to help one appreciate their own work. Three of our events were recognized for their quality and impact on Jewish life. I was over joyed and proud of my chapter. They deserve those awards.

Then came the time for the Most Improved Chapter of the Year Award, which did not go to us. As the winning chapter got up to accept their plaque, I thought to myself, That will be our goal for next year. Then Ilana the regional president went on to describe the Chapter of Excellence for the year, which is a chapter that show outstanding qualities (not to be confused with Chapter of the Year). Apparently there was a hint that it was us, but I missed it. I was just sitting there wondering which chapter it would be. Then she said, "DerbyUSY." My jaw fell to the floor, and my eyes get misty.

Maybe we had a better year than I could recognize, being so saturated by it. And the best part of it all is that not one of my core members feels complacement. Each of them began to think of ways to be even better the next year. I love those kids. They help me love what I do. And for that I thank them. Thank you Rachel, Chelsea, Molly, Angela, Jackie, Ben, Mike, Schuyler, and Mike (different Mike).

Border States

2005-02-21T11:52:00.000-05:00

When trying to break down some borders, I forgot about the ones right in front of my face.

For most youth groups, Jewish or not, the nation is divided into regions. Kentucky happens to be a region called Central Region of United Synagogue Youth (CRUSY). But here is the joke: almost every city in our region is over three hours away by car. And the punchline is that there are chapters of our youth group just over the border in Tennessee that we do not even know. And those chapters bear a striking resemblance to ours, especially the chapter in Nashville.

So to fix that problem, I simply called the Nashville chaper and asked if they wanted to get together for a weekend. And after months of anticipation and a flurry of phone calls and emails over the past two week, USY Without Borders was born.

A bulky white 15-passenger van carrying ten kids and me made its way down to Nashville this past weekend to spend time with another chapter. I was worried that the kids wouldn't mix. That each would stick to their own, circling around like wagons under attack.

I was only partially proved correct.

The high school kids that came down with our group took to their group like fish to water. The weekend was filled with dinner, song, jokes, intense conversation about topics that would make parents nervous, line dancing, lasertag, pizza, food, study and fellowship. By the end of the weekend, plans were already in the air for when they would be coming to visit us.

But even with the arbitrary border breeched, there was another border that I did not give enough consideration before the trip. For the latter half of the school year, our chapter promotes the 8th graders to USY (i.e. high school) status. Five of our ten travellers were 8th grade boys. Their counterparts in Nashville only become USY at the end of the summer before 9th grade.

The world that 8th graders occupy bears little relation to the world of high school. I could see the border between then throughout the weekend. At time, it would give way. Others times, it was a steel wall. The Nashville youth advisor and I spent a good portion of our weekend making sure that everyone had a good time. We could tell that they felt left out, teased and made to feel less. Luckily, a lot of the weekend, gave them time to hang out together as a group, which is good, because they are the future of USY in Louisville.

If I could to it over, I would have included their 8th graders or left ours at home. However, I think that those five boys did come home more part of USY than before. Maybe when they are the older bunch, they will think back on this weekend, and treat those new 8th graders differently.

Nah, probably not.

The Long and Winding Road

2005-02-14T23:28:00.000-05:00

I just returned from a regional convention for middle school kids from all over our youth group region (www.CRUSY.org). I got to play surrogate parent for fifteen of our Kadima chapter's kids. (We would have had 16 kids go, but Jordan broke his arm the night before we left.) The bus ride up functions as a crescendo. Our pre-dawn departure lead to picking up nine more from Lexington, which was followed by a surge of kids from Cincinnati. The peak of the crescendo comes are the kids enter the building and join the entire convention of over 200 people from our five states. That alone makes the trip worthwhile. If I can help kids see themselves are part of the larger Jewish world, that is something right there.

The one major thing that I came away with from this weekend was the I see the need for a high degree of flexibility when it comes to Jewish education. Yes, we are part of the Conservative movement. That means we value both tradition and change. So our prayer services reflect the ones from our synagogues. But the thing is that most adults find our services difficult to draw meaning and inspiration. True that USY provides more singing than some congregations, but the time spent during services does not feel well spent. We need to do the minimum that Jewish Law requires (which is its own valuable lesson) and then spend the freed up time creating and developing a dynamic connection between ourselves and our liturgy.

I am going to take steps to see that we devote more of our time at conventions to creative services and less time to reproducing the same services that these kids see week in week out.

And that bus ride home provided a wonderful parallel to the beginning. Going from a full bus to just our chapter was remarkable. As the bus depleted, the kids from Louisville did not spread out all around the bus. They stuck together, and seemed to form the core of a great Kadima chapter. Maybe this trip prove to be a crucible that forges them together.

Havraya is Born!

2005-02-06T10:45:00.001-05:00

Last Thursday night, ten men gathered in a friend's home to form something new. Ten men set out to set aside a fixed time every month to come together to study, share and grow. The biggest challenge was choosing what to spend our time on.Everyone comes from such different backgrounds and levels of knowledge. But we chose to use Rabbi Jeffrey Salkin's "Searching for My Brothers: Jewish Men in a Gentile World." Hopefully this book with help us turn in all three critical directions: into our past, into ourselves, to each other and to the future. I hope that everyone left the room that night with a sense that we had begun something exciting and meaningful. This setting will enable us to get to know each other in a way the men are not encouraged to in our day. My mind is already on March 3, our next meeting

Creating the Beautiful Life

2005-02-06T10:45:00.000-05:00

Last night after Shabbat, I remembered one aspect of what makes Judaism compelling for me is that Judaism can make life beautiful. Every moment can be either mundane or holy. Judaism provides ways to make moments beautiful. Yes, one can simply eat. But one can add study, song and prayer to any meal. The meal is elevated from the mundane to the holy.

Last night, we could have all gathered for a small end of Shabbat meal at the synagogue and discussed sports, but instead people chatted, we studied Torah, we sang songs that are traditional for that time of day on Shabbat, and we thanked the Holy One for the food that ate. We made the end of Shabbat beautiful.

Yes, ritual can be done in a perfunctory and dull manner. But that is a choice we make. Yes, you have to learn something about the ritual to give it meaning, to be able to make it more beautiful. But whoever said that Judaism was something handed to you on a platter. Ask any gardener about the work is takes to make a beautiful garden. Ask any chef about the time it takes to plan, prepare and present a beautiful meal. Ask any parent about the amount of work to raise a mentsch.

There is a meta-mitzvah called hiddur mitzvah, which means to beautify the commandment. We are challenged to make doing the mitzvot beautiful. And knowing the full range of mitzvot, there no parts of life exempt from this.

I also learned this year from the Jewish Federation that a two word slogan can say a lot, so here is my version:

Live Beautifully.

Old Wine in a New Flask

2005-02-03T15:10:00.000-05:00

This past Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, I was in charge of the Family Service at my wife's congregation. I bring images of paintings and sculptures, poetry and drama that illustrate narratives from the Torah to provides a text for interpretation that anyone can read at almost any age. The dicsussion focuses on the big issues: What sacrifices are we willing to make for our religion? For our families? Is God essentially compassionate or strict? Over the course of these sacred days, I saw that the parents were far more interested in the kind of study that I was going for, especially the fathers. Which got me thinking: What if there were a group here for Jewish men to engage in contemplative study?

IRONY #1: The Jewish world used to be just that almost to the exclusion of all else. Jewish learning was almost exclusively the domain of boys and men studying the Talmud part of full time. And this is still true is some segments of the Jewish world today. Here in the US, Judaism changed into something that was part time for all. And in the liberal Jewish world, there are few places for men to come together for sacred study. It simply does not exist here and now.

Within two days, the idea had almost fully formed: Louisville's first (at least in a while) Jewish men's study group. I even had the name picked out: Havraya. The name is taken from the Zohar, our premier book of Jewish mysticism. In it, a group of men travel together through the Torah which is protrayed as a geographic place. The text is the land! We will journey through it together!

IRONY #2: I went to the web to see what is being done now in the Jewish community at large. In short: nothing. The only websites that had anything to offer were by Messianic Jews or Jews for Jesus, who are essentially Christians posing as Jews. But they had some great ideas.

So finally, I put my head together with my friend BJ, and we came up with a list of people we wanted to invite from various congregations around town, and sent them all a letter about the group. The first meeting is tonight. I have no idea what will actually form out of this first encounter. I'm going to facilitate, and let the group become what it will be. What will we do together? What will the personality of the group be? But I am dying to see what holy sparks we can create together!

Celebrating Rashi's Life, Work and Legacy

2005-02-03T13:26:00.000-05:00

Foundation for Planned Giving

One other project that I am involved with here in Louisville is a year long celebration of Rashi's life, work and legacy. Sheldon Gilman, an active member of the Jewish community here was inspired by a biography about Rashi (by Maurice Liber) to have Louisville come together to learn about and be inspired by Rashi's legacy. I am the coordinator of the whole project, which goes from January through December of this year. We kicked off the year with a wrap for the local Jewish newspaper. I wrote some of the articles for the wrap, including an advice column called Dear Rashi, which will appear once a month. We are bringing in a number of scholars, changing our focus and doing some great interfaith work and more. Stay tuned.

Kulanu: All of Us

2005-02-03T13:06:00.000-05:00

Kulanu: All of Us

This website is dedicated to isolated Jewish communities all over the world. You may have read of the Abayudaya, the Jews of Uganda. You can read al about their story on this website. Where this whole thing gets back to Louisville is through my friends Rick and Rachel who know Gershom Sizomo, the first member of the Abayudaya to formally study to become a rabbi. Gershom, his wife Tzippora and their two children have moved to LA for Gershom's studies. And what is more amazing is that Gershom is not only their leader of his people, their mohel and founder of their day schools, he is up for a Grammy Award for the album Abayudaya: Music from the Jewish People of Uganda. My goal is to bring Gershom and his family to Louisville for a weekend of learning, stories and song. I hope it all works out!

Transformative Education

2005-02-02T04:40:00.000-05:00

One of the hats I wear in Louisville is director of our branch of the Florence Melton Adult Mini-School (www.fmams.co.il), which is a great adult education program geared towards making Jewish adults more Jewishly literate. This jobs actually makes me feel that I am fulfilling my mission as a rabbi. Some of the jobs I have had in the past couple years boiled down to event planning without anything deep or transformative at the core.

Seeing Jewish adults choose to spend their time learning together in a caring communal setting...there are few things as wonderful. So many Jewish adults simply have a weak connection to their roots, their community, to the larger Jewish world, to their inner selves. And I can see a generation of kids with the same disconnect coming down the pipes. It is a privilege to be involved with a program that devotes itself to giving people a present, past and future.

Learning is something that people can do simply to grow in soul. If you have the time, pick up a book that inspires you. If you do not have the time, make the time. Take ten minutes. Read something that makes you feel connected to others, to yourself, to what is most important to you. There is a tale of a young student who rushes to find his rabbi. Upon finding him, he says with an air of self-importance, "Rabbi, I have gone through the entire Talmud!" For those of you who do not know, this is no mean feat which typically takes a least seven years. The rabbis responds, "Fine, but has the Talmud gone through you?"

Learn. Live. Love.

Everybody! Everybody!

2005-01-31T23:54:00.000-05:00

Everybody! Everybody!

This is by far one of my favorite websites. Check in weekly for updates, and be sure to check out the archives for some great on-line cartoons.

Life and death all rolled in to one.

2005-01-31T14:45:00.000-05:00

Today is both the first birthday of my daughter, Aviyah, and the first anniversary of the death of my father-in-law, Alan Stone. Today there will be two candles lit. One for life and one for death. Funny thing is that the candle for Alan burns the whole day, while Aviyah's candle will be lit for a short while and then blown out. Aviyah is growing, and not just in the physical sense of the word. She is becoming more of a person each day. In the past two weeks, she has begun to walk more, play more, laugh more, and make her own brand of jokes. Yesterday, she put a towel on her head and crawled in to show Hadar, her big sister. Aviyah becomes more in my mind. Alan seems to become less. I knew him for several years. I spent many weekends with him and Marilyn, Paula's parents. We did not have a lot of conversations together. He was a quiet man with a lot going on in his mind. Alan was such a presence in his home and in his family's life. When he died, it was hard not to notice, even living as far away from New Jersey as we do. Still, Alan has faded a bit in my mind over the past year. In his last days in hospice, I saw his life-force flicker and diminish. This might be why the yahrtzeit burns for one full day, and the birthday candle only for moments. Perhaps each is inversely propotional to their image in our minds. Aviyah's life burns brightly; we need no reminder. Alan's life is becoming memory, legend; we need concrete ways to remember him.

In Judaism, people are sometimes quick to shy away from talk of the afterlife. In one of the most often recited blessings, we say, "Bountiful are You, Adonai, Reviver of the Dead." Many moderns find this difficult. God is going to revive the dead? When? How? Why? People often fudge the translation, making it out to mean that people become immortal through the memories of their family. But I fear that this is not true. Yes, in one generation, one can keep memories alive, and mabye Hadar and Aviyah will, and maybe their children will. But how much longer can that go on? My optimistic side tells me that Judaism has done well with this challenge for over 3000 years. My pessimistic side tells me that when it comes to individuals, there are just too many people to remember with such detail. Perhaps that is why the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) tells of so few individuals. The Tanakh is more the story of a nation than anything else. So if there is something about us that is immortal, I do not know what it is. But memories do fade. And that candle sitting on my stove is one of the few things that will jog our memories.

But wait. There is another. Actually, for Alan, one just need ask about Aviyah's name to hear the story of last year. Aviyah was born two weeks before Alan died. She was named Zivah Ariel, for Paula's grandfather and for my grandmother. But when Alan died, we changed the name to Aviyah, God is my Father, for Alan, whose Hebrew name was Avraham Avigdor. Alan was buried on Friday and Aviyah was named in Paula's home synagogue the very next day. You should have seen how people tried to greet us with such news. The Yin-Yang was palpable. As it should be.