High Holy Day Service Options for Families at RS

High Holy Days Services for Families with Young Children


Contemporary Multi-generational Morning Services

Requires a “pass”; please contact Catherine Fischer cfischer@rodephshalom.org to become a member or prospective member and get a pass.

Rosh Hashanah: Mon., September 14, 8:30 am

Yom Kippur: Wed., September 23, 8:30 am

A full service for adults; yet a family-friendly atmosphere with children of all ages. Clergy, congregational choir, and guitar lead accessible music, encouraging participants to join in. Designed for all ages, the informality provides a comfortable setting for families with young children and there are activities for the children during the sermon.

Tashlich Service at Fairmount Waterworks
Mon., September 14, 1:30pm
640 Water Works Drive Philadelphia, PA 19130
Cast away your sins with breadcrumbs.  Open to all.

Afternoon Mini-Service for Families

Open to the community; no charge, please just bring photo ID for security.

Rosh Hashanah: Mon., September 14, 3:00 pm
Yom Kippur: Wed., September 23, 8:30 am

A very brief service for families of very young children and their parents and grandparents.

As If It’s All Happening on An Airplane: Vulnerability and the High Holy Days

I believe there are some of you here who are in the dating world, hoping to meet someone special.  I thought of you when I read a recent column by Emma Court in the NY Times called, “A Millenial’s Guide to Kissing.”

It begins: “When a total stranger kissed me under the artificial lights of an airplane cabin somewhere above international waters, my first thought was of the Orthodox woman sitting to my left…The kiss, coming out of nowhere, had turned me into the heroine of a bad romance novel: heart fluttering…those blue fleece blankets had never been so sexy….Between us sprang the kind of instant intimacy fostered by open personalities in tight quarters. We spoke in spurts of our trips and what we had done during the days spent in Israel…

[Once back on the ground], I hugged him a brisk no-nonsense goodbye. We didn’t exchange numbers…… Would things have been different, if one of us had had the courage, to say something other than goodbye before heading to our trains? I only realized later why it had been such an oddly familiar feeling: My generation treats every liaison as if it is happening on an airplane. Our story wasn’t so different, after all. I wonder what we collectively lose as we try so hard not to care. We pretend that it doesn’t matter, that we have time, that because we are young we are invulnerable.” Continue reading

Our Common Home: The Pope’s Encyclical in the Jewish Community

by Rabbi Jill Maderer

So… Who is in the box?  Who’s home falls in the Center City travel box when our special guest, the Pope, visits Philadelphia this fall? Me, too.  Although still not complete, this week’s transportation and security update began to feed my hunger for a better understanding about how my family will function, how emergencies will be addressed, and of course, how we are going to get the Jewish community to synagogue.  As complicated as the Pope’s visit will be from a logistical perspective, I am intrigued about how we in the Jewish community, might find meaning in this historical moment.Continue reading

We All Have Rivers to Cross: Learning Prayer from our Ancestors

Glendasan River, Wicklow MountainsDelivered by Rabbi Jill Maderer this Shabbat...   Thank you to Roberta for your beautiful Torah reading.  When Roberta began to prepare for her Adult B’nei Mitzvah earlier this year, she felt especially draw to chanting Torah.  It was then that her mother reminded her: Roberta’s great-grandfather was a hazzan–a traditional cantor.  This powerful link to her roots — spanning time and space — deepened Roberta’s Torah experience all the more so.

This summer, as we encounter Mishkan HaNefesh, our new High Holy Day Machzor, we are posting a weekly question for your response. This week, we asked: From what person or event in Jewish history or in Jewish tradition do you draw inspiration?  In other words, what are the lessons you learn from Jews of the past?

In Roberta’s case, a teacher of Jewish ritual who was a relative from her own family touched her.  For many, teachers from Jewish history offer connection.  We are not alone in our Jewish quest for meaning.Continue reading

Our Concealed Shortcomings and Charleston

By Rabbi Jill Maderer

Rebbe Nachman of Brastlav tells this tale: A young man leaves his home to learn a trade. Years later, he returns to his family and shares that he has become a master in the art of menorah making.  He asks his parents to invite all of the other artisans in town to come see his masterpiece — a candelabra inspired by those of the ancient Temple in Jerusalem.  So all the finest crafters come to view this man’s menorah. Later, the son asks his parents, “What did you think?”  They reply, “We’re sorry to say all of your fellow lamp-makers told us that it was a flawed, ugly piece.”  “Ah,” replies the son, “but that is the secret! Yes, they all say it was ugly, but what nobody realizes is this: Each sees a different part as ugly. Each overlooks the mistakes that he himself would make, and sees only the shortcomings of the others.  “You see, I made this menorah in this way on purpose — completely out of mistakes and deficiencies — in order to demonstrate that none of us has perfection.”

In Psalm 90, the Psalmist calls to God: “You can see our concealed darkness; You can see our concealed shortcomings, in the light of Your face.”  Perhaps God can see our shortcomings, but can we?

Broken-hearted to live in a society where a white man enters a black church with his gun and brutally murders nine African American souls who are studying Bible, Continue reading

Demand Fair School Funding Tomorrow: Interfaith Shabbat Service in Harrisburg

Saturday, June 20: Prayer Service in Harrisburg

Rabbi Eli Freedman will lead Shabbat morning prayer and people of faith from across the state will gather to at our State Capitol to demand a moral budget that fully funds public schools. Participants from Rodeph Shalom will be carpooling from the synagogue. Contact Rachel Thomas (rthomas@rodephshalom.org)  about making arrangements for either driving or riding to Harrisburg.
10:30AM | Shabbat Service | Steps of the State Capitol
12PM | Interfaith Ceremony | Steps of the State Capitol

The Power of a Spiritual Foundation in Our Quest for Wholeness

by Rabbi Jill Maderer

Last week, at my annual physical, I brought the health forms my doctor is required to complete, so that I may serve on faculty for two weeks this summer at our Reform Movement’s Jewish camp, Harlam.  The camp does not provide a different version of the health form for faculty, so it can be humorously confusing for the doctor to complete questions that were clearly created for an adolescent.  You can imagine.  As the doctor continues to read down the list of possible ailments, there’s this: does the camper have a problem with eating disorders?  With cutting? The doctor looks up at me.  “What kind of camp is this?!  A place for troubled teens?”  “No,” I reply, “it’s just Jewish camp.  We worry a lot.”

And truth– there is a lot to worry about.   When I think of what it means to raise children and adolescents or to exist as adults in our world, the challenges to a healthy and whole life are overwhelming.  Yet there are real resources in our quest for wholeness.Continue reading

#rsgrows: A Building Expansion Fueled by Purpose

It has been so exciting to see the expansion go up here at Rodeph Shalom.  And now here we are, almost complete, with the May 17 Dedication happening this month!  In last weekend’s Sunday seminar, our expansion chairperson Michael Hauptman taught that the master planning for the space began in 1992!

The meaning of our new addition is certainly not limited to bricks and mortar.  The power of the renovation and expansion has been that, every step of the way, our leadership’s decisions have been mission-driven, fueled by our vision of the people and purpose who will fill its space.  Not once has this congregation set out to create a museum; this is a center for living Judaism, where we honor the past, celebrate the present, and shape the future of Jewish life in Philadelphia.

And so it made sense when, about a year ago, a congregant suggested we consider a Jewish text, that might appear on the external Broad Street wall.  Continue reading

On Public Shaming, a Compassion Deficit and Monica Lewinsky

by Rabbi Jill Maderer

This week’s Torah portion, Shmini, describes what can serve as a korban–a sacrifice.  And when the wrong thing is used as a korban, tragedy results.

Recently, Monica Lewinsky has made the news, because she has begun to speak publicly about the media storm that consumed her identity.  Now at the age of 41, the former Whitehouse intern reflects back when she was 22, and made serious and foolish mistakes, when she began a relationship with her older and exceedingly more powerful boss, the then president of the United States.  Lewinsky’s boss abused his power and her friend violated her trust.  Still, the most painful part of the experience for Lewinsky was the public humiliation she endured.

In 1998, our society allowed the wrong thing to be used as a korban–a sacrifice– when Monica Lewinsky became the first person to be publicly shamed in the age of the internet.  Everyone knew her mistakes, many seemed to derive joy from degrading her, ostracizing her, reducing her to her faults, and exaggerating them beyond recognition. Continue reading

“Once We Were Slaves:” The Modern Slavery of Human Trafficking*

At this week’s seder, Jews recited “Once we were slaves.” Who, today, is still vulnerable to the shackles of injustice?  I recently learned about a sex trafficking awareness initiative of the Women of Vision, a part of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia. I am grateful to the Federation for shining a light on women’s inequality, vulnerability and grave injustices involved in modern slavery.

It is common to assume human trafficking is a far-off problem.  Such distance can make it easier to ignore.  But that’s just not the case.  The more survivor stories I read, the more I can imagine these victims living right in my city.  According to statistics, chances are, they do.

This fall, the Bucks County Courier Times reported on a woman named Jennifer Spry.  Spry grew up in suburban, middle-class Montgomery County and as an 8-year old, was allowed to walk to the Church playground just down the road, playing so close to her home that she could hear her mother call her for dinner.  While playing in what was practically an extension of her own yard, Spry was manipulated by a neighbor offering toys.  Once she was in his home, she was forced to allow his “clients” to perform sexual acts while he took photographs.  The neighbor told Spry that if she ever told, he would kidnap her sister and murder her mother.Continue reading