Families with children at RS: Please join Dena Herrin, Rabbi Jill Maderer and Michael Hauptman to learn about the plans for much needed new classrooms, new event spaces, and safety and accessibility improvements critical for bringing our building into the 21st century. Th., Oct. 3 at 6pm at the Fairmount home of Kate and Mike Riccardi. Free babysitting and pizza age 5+ at the home of Judy and Larry Mester, just a few doors down. Thank you to the Mesters and the Riccardis for co-hosting! Please RSVP to Shelley Saunders at ssaunders@rodephshalom.org or 215-627-6747 x44.Continue reading
Cooking for Caring Community with CSA
To sign up for a share in next year’s Community Supported Agriculture at RS with Barefoots Organics, and receive a weekly box of fresh veggies throughout the growing season, click here.
Ethan Kadish Battles after Lightening Strike
The boy most critically injured by the lightening strike at the Reform Jewish overnight camp, mentioned early in this Yom Kippur sermon, continues to battle for his life. The end of this article tells us how we can help Ethan Kadish. As our hearts go out to Ethan and the Kadish family, we pray they will find health and wholeness.
Gather Us: Yom Kippur Morning Sermon
[vimeo http://vimeo.com/69479024] At the beginning of this summer, we learned of a shocking story. One afternoon at our Reform Jewish camp in Indiana, during a game of ultimate frisbee, a rogue lightening bolt struck the athletic field. The lightening seriously injured 3 campers. Staff performed CPR, and the children were transported to the hospital. In the immediate wake of the havoc, everyone gathered in the dining hall, where the camp director led a Misheberach. What happened next? The camp broke into song. Continue reading
What is Your Food Worth?: Sukkot Reflection
Explore how we set intentions for Jewish food choices in our kick-off to our What is Your Food Worth initiative and first Sunday Seminar of the year. Our discussion with Nati Passow, director of the Jewish Farm School, and Rabbi Eli Freedman is tomorrow, September 22nd 10:15-11:15am. Whet your appetite with Nati’s thought provoking blog post. This opportunity is a part of our What is Your Food Worth partnership with the Feinstein Center for American Jewish History at Temple University.Sukkot: The Illusion of Shelter
Why do we build a shelter that provides no shelter at all?
Growing up in suburban NJ, my home was not in a high-crime area. Yet, always, we locked the doors and we turned on the security alarm. We even had a big dog bowl on the front porch, to convince all external threats into thinking we had a guard dog (we didn’t even have a goldfish). And I don’t think our family’s efforts for protection were unusual. But friends of ours who lived not far away took a different approach. they left their doors unlocked every time they left their house. Simply because that is how they wanted to live their lives.Continue reading
We Were Strangers, Too: American Jewish Community Answering the Call for Immigration Reform
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoRe2JDkPqU]
Be inspired by President Obama’s testament to the Jewish people’s devotion to answering the call! Please share your family’s history and learn simple ways to advocate for fair, comprehensive immigration reform here.
We Were Strangers, Too: Immigration Reform Advocacy
Join the Jewish community’s effort to welcome the stranger as a citizen, and advocate for comprehensive, fair immigration reform for 11 million undocumented immigrants today (info in my Yom Kippur afternoon sermon). Please add your family’s immigration story in the comments of this blog article to create a beautiful collection that demonstrates that we are a nation of immigrants.
For a direct connection to your representative, go to Take Action. At the bottom, enter your zip and add the link to this blog post to the form letter to share with your representative our collection of family immigration stories, found in the post comments.
We Were Strangers, Too: Yom Kippur Sermon on Immigration Reform
A few years ago, while celebrating Shabbat with our preschool students, I was teaching the Jewish value of welcoming the stranger. Thinking that I was encouraging the young children to be kind to a new student, I asked them, what do you think the Torah tells us to do when we meet a stranger? … “Don’t talk to them!” “Find a grown-up you know!” “Don’t take candy!”
The children had been well-prepared for stranger-danger, as four-year olds should be. The students’ response, appropriate for young children, highlights a heightened sense of caution present for adults as well. Natural fear of that which is strange to us has a tendency to become so magnified that we are at risk of losing sight of our values.Continue reading
Choosing Life, Blessing and Joy
Reading Nitzavim on Yom Kippurby Rabbi Sue Levi Elwell
“You stand this day, all of you, before your God, the Holy One of Blessing: you tribal heads, you elders, and you officials, all the men of Israel, you children, you women, even the stranger within your camp, from woodchopper to water drawer … ” (Deuteronomy 29)
The opening of Nitzavim grabs us by our lapels and looks each of us directly in the eye. All of you, each of you, whether you stand at the top or at the bottom of the food chain, whether you command the attention and admiration of many or whether your labor goes almost unnoticed, you stand this day, poised to enter into a relationship with God, a relationship that demands your full attention.Continue reading
