Shabbat – Page 2 – Rodeph Shalom

Crowd Sourcing Sermons

Imagine that you are a member of the Rodeph Shalom clergy team, and you could tap into the collective wisdom of our congregation to help you write your sermons this summer.

That is exactly what we are going to do this summer with CROWDSOURCING SUMMER SERMON SERIES.

What is Crowdsourcing? It is the process of obtaining ideas or content by soliciting contributions from a large group of people, especially from the online community. (Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, 2014)

What is Crowdsourcing a Sermon? It is an opportunity for us to draw inspiration from your comments and to encourage conversation among our congregants on important Jewish issues. Crowdsourcing sermons will be a way for us to find an opportunity to draw closer as a community. It will be a way for us to fulfill our Vision of creating profound connectionsContinue reading

Counting the Omer: Shabbat Wonder

“Wonder, rather than doubt, is the root of all knowledge,” taught Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. As we count the Omer on this Shabbat, we dedicate ourselves to opening our eyes to the wonder all around us.

Baruch Ata Adonai, Elohenu Melech ha-olam asher kidishanu b’mitzvotav vitzivanu al s’firat ha’omer. Blessed are You, Eternal our God, Ruler of the universe, who makes us holy with sacred actions and enjoins us to count the omer.

Hayom shishah v’arba-im yom, shehem shishah shavuot v’arba-ah yamim la-omer.

Today is 46 days which is 6 weeks and 6 days of the Omer.

Shabbat shalom–Your RS Clergy

How Do You Recharge?

One of you recently shared with me: “Question: If someone from the 1950’s suddenly appeared today, what would be the most difficult thing to explain to them about life today? Answer: I possess a device in my pocket that is capable of accessing the entirety of information known to humankind. I use it to look at pictures of cats and to get into arguments with strangers.”

On the Shabbat of March 7 -March 8 was the National Day of Unplugging. Originally conceived by a group of Jewish artists, the day is meant to help us think differently about our re-chargeable devices in order to re-charge ourselves.Continue reading

The Burning Bush: The Fire Within

In his D’var Torah last Shabbat, Rabbi Kuhn challenged us to wrestle with the question: what is my purpose?

At the end of each book of Torah, there is a gap, a space. There is a legend that the white spaces in Torah are known as “white fire,” and the words of Torah are written in “black fire.” There is an extra amount of white fire between each book. So, last week we completed the study of the Book of Genesis, and tonight we begin anew with our study of the Book of Exodus. The extra space between Genesis and Exodus can represent a pause, a time for us to stop and think about our lives, and a chance to change, and to consider the meaning of our lives.Continue reading

Shabbat: A Metaphor for Meditation

At our congregation’s Jewish Meditation just before Shabbat 2 weeks ago, Moshe (Mel) Seligsohn shared this intention (join us for our final week of this series of Meditation this Friday, 5:00-5:30 pm, and please contact me to share whether you’d be interested in more meditation opportunities in the future):

How Is Jewish meditation different from other forms of meditation, especially the “still” forms we think of as those from India, Tibet and the East?

Any prayer is a meditation, so if you’re praying, you’re meditating and vice versa. This is true in all faiths. And the intention is universal–the desire to create an intimate relationship to the Devine Realm. Perhaps what makes Jewish prayer somewhat distinctive is verbalization…”Hear (listen!), Oh, Israel…” and its communal expression…”the Lord OUR G-d, the Lord is One.” Our silent prayers are also invoked communally.Continue reading

Profound Moments: Dena Herrin

By Dena Herrin, RS President

Before I tell you about a profound moment that I had, let me give you some context. As some of you know, my connections to Judaism for most of my life were weak at best. I left Hebrew school, which I hated, at 10 years old and barely stepped in a synagogue for the next 25 years. I occasionally went with my parents for the High Holy Days, but really didn’t understand or engage in the service. The word and concept of God made me very uncomfortable, still does. Our Rosh Hashanah dinners, Yom Kippur breakfasts and Passover Seders were occasions I enjoyed as family gatherings, and to a much lesser extent, cultural events. For me, there really was no spirituality or deep religious context to these holidays. I joined Rodeph Shalom in an effort to find some Jewish connection for my children. We are an interfaith family and my Jewish foundations were simply too shallow to provide relevant content and meaning for my family. I share this background because the moment that I want to tell you about occurred in the sanctuary here, at Rodeph Shalom, at a time when my connections to Judaism and to the synagogue were very superficial.

Shabbat at RS: A Palace in Time

by Rabbi Bill Kuhn

The vision of Congregation Rodeph Shalom is to offer the kind of Friday evening Shabbat worship service which will help create profound connections among all of our congregants. On Friday evenings we hope all of our congregation will come together to welcome Shabbat and to pray together, to support each other in times of need and in times of joy, to socialize together and to build a strong sense of community. In order to do this, we are trying to create the kind of uplifting and transformative worship service that will attract the diverse population within Rodeph Shalom, a service which will be participatory, warm, inclusive, welcoming, spiritual and meaningful, which will help everyone connect with each other, with the soul of Jewish prayer, and with God. Continue reading

Spiritual Luster and Equations: A Profound Moment

by Thomas Perloff, presented at August 12 Shabbat Service

Before sharing a profound moment, I would like to provide some background.

First, I am a numbers guy. In high school, I won the math prize. In college, I majored in economics. In graduate school I pursued economics and was steeped in econometrics, graphs and statistics. For thirty-some years I worked in the low margin foodservice distribution business, where, if you didn’t pay close attention to the numbers, your business was not sustainable.Continue reading

Understanding Profound Moments: Open to Inexplicable Concepts

by Michael Hauptman, presented at July 22 Shabbat Service

After my grandmother died, I remember my mother asking me whether I believed in an afterlife; whether after you died, some part of your being remained and watched over the living. Being the self-absorbed, unsentimental twenty-one-year-old that I’m sure I was at that time, my response was honest and blunt: “No, I believe that when you’re dead, you’re dead”, Continue reading