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August Book Club

08/06/2024 05:15:04 PM

Aug6

This month's meeting is pushed back a week due to scheduling conflicts! We will meet the first Wednesday of September at 10:30 on Zoom to discuss The Genizah of the House of Shepher.

Tamar Yellin is an artic­u­late, intel­li­gent, and pas­sion­ate defend­er of the val­ue and...Read more...

Book Club: July

07/04/2024 11:34:55 AM

Jul4

Join us the last Wednesday of the month at 10:30 on Zoom to discuss our next Book Club pick. This month we are reading The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store by James McBride.

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Book Club: June

06/16/2024 12:09:23 PM

Jun16

Our Book Club meetings are back to the last Wednesday of the month! Still on zoom at 10:30. Our pick this month is Operation Bethlehem by Yariv Inbar.

"A traumatic anti-Semitic attack during his...Read more...

Adult Ed: The Torah of Social Media

06/16/2024 10:12:42 AM

Jun16

Continuing from our conversations the last two weeks, we will look at ways Social Media can be used for good and for bad in Jewish communal settings.

Relevant excerpt from a contemporary study/commentary on the Book of Kings

The Ethics of Social Media by Rabbi Marina Yergin

What to Memes Tells Us About Jewish Identity?

Miriam Anzovin is the Talmud Master of the 21st Century

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Adult Ed: The Torah of Social Media

05/30/2024 12:22:35 PM

May30

As we have been doing all year, we begin this round of Adult Ed with the text study from Project Zug by Hadar. This text study is a bit longer than some of the others, so it will take at least two full classes. It focuses mostly on the topic of Lashon Hara, "evil speech" or gossip, and extrapolates out from there to discuss how we use social media.

After we finish using the Hadar materials, we will disucss our own approaches to social...Read more...

Book Club: May

05/30/2024 11:10:09 AM

May30

On the first Thursday of June, we will meet at 10:30 am via Zoom to discuss May's reading: On Her Own by Lihi Lapid.

Watching her Russian immigrant mother, Irina, struggle to put food on the table, Nina, a beautiful and restless teenager, vows her life will be different. When a strapping...Read more...

Adult Ed: Visiting the Sick

04/14/2024 11:34:30 AM

Apr14

For our second class of this unit, we begin with an additional source sheet, which offers more perspectives from the ancient rabbis beyond the text in our Hadar book we looked at last week. We continue the conversation of how this mitzvah came to be and how we continue to honor it as Jews today.

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Adult Ed: Visiting the Sick

04/05/2024 08:36:29 AM

Apr5

On April 7th, we will look at Rabbi Avital Hochstein's Talmudic Exploration of the mitzvah of visiting the sick. 

On April 14th, we will segue the conversation to how this mitzvah has looked in practice over the centuries.

On April 21st, we will discuss the possibility and set parameters for a Bikur Cholim committee at Ner Shalom!

 

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Book Club: April

04/03/2024 02:39:47 PM

Apr3

  Our next book is A multigenerational family saga about the long-lasting reverberations of one tragic summer by "a wonderful talent [who] should be read widely" (Edward P. Jones).
We will meet on May 2nd at 10:30 am via Zoom to discuss As Close to Us As Breathing by Elizabeth Poliner.  
In 1948, a small stretch of the Woodmont, Connecticut shoreline, affectionately named "Bagel Beach," has long been a summer destination for Jewish families. Here sisters Ada, Vivie, and Bec assemble at their beloved family cottage, with children in tow and weekend-only husbands who arrive each Friday in time for the Sabbath meal.Read more...

Adult Ed: Torah of Music

02/28/2024 09:11:49 AM

Feb28

After discussing music as prophecy from the Hadar materials, we moved on to discussing the range of Jewish music, what makes music Jewish or Spiritual, and what our Torah songs are. Playlists reflective of our class can be found on YouTube or Spotify.

Our final session will be in person so that we can SING!

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Book Club: March

02/28/2024 09:09:29 AM

Feb28

Join us the last Thursday of each month at 10:30 on zoom to participate in our Book Club!

This month we are reading The Muralist by B. S. Shapiro.

When Alizée Benoit, an American painter working for the Works Progress Administration (WPA), vanishes in New York City in 1940, no one...Read more...

Adult Ed: The Torah of Music

02/03/2024 02:28:29 PM

Feb3

We will begin this course by discussion Joey Weisenberg's Source Sheet and discussion questions from Hadar's Project Zug.

In later weeks, we will also be sharing our own favorite Jewish music or other songs that make our souls rise. The last session of our class will be in person, to sing together synchronously.

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Book Club: February

02/03/2024 02:23:55 PM

Feb3

Our next Book Club Meeting will be February 22nd at 10:30 AM via Zoom. We will be discussing Rachel Maddow's Prequel.

Inspired by her research for the hit podcast Ultra, Rachel Maddow charts the rise of a wild American strain of authoritarianism that has been alive on the far-right edge of our...Read more...

Book Club: January

01/03/2024 09:21:15 AM

Jan3

Next month (date coming soon) we will explore the heroine of our novel's efforts and feelings about the history of her family members who lived and died in the Holocaust. Amazon's description of The Postcard by Anne Berest follows: A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
TIME Magazine・NPR・Library Journal・The Globe and Mail・Lilith...Read more...

Intro to Judaism

01/03/2024 09:12:03 AM

Jan3

Rabbi Lizz will be leading an Intro to Judaism course, intended for those looking into conversion but also open to those simply interested in brushing up on their basics. If you have already taken an Intro to Judaism class with Rabbi Lizz, you have taken this intro to Judaism class.

We will meet via Zoom at 7 pm on Thursdays for 8 weeks, through January and February. The course is based loosely on the Union for Reform Judaism's intro...Read more...

December Book Club

12/03/2023 02:28:44 PM

Dec3

Our next book is a spy book that we will chew over on Thursday, December 28, 2023 at 10:30 a.m. The name of the book is The Kill Artist by Daniel Silva and amazon.com's view of the book follow's:     From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Other Woman comes the first novel in the...Read more...

Book Club: November

10/30/2023 11:00:11 AM

Oct30

We will meet on Zoom, November 29, at noon to discuss our next book, Before the Books Were Burned: A Novel by Lawrence Samuel Shaw.       According to amazon.com: In Lawrence Samuel Shaw's novel, Before the Books Were Burned, we meet a young Adolf Hitler as a manipulative mendacious boy whose obsession...Read more...

Adult Ed: Power and Money

10/22/2023 08:56:01 AM

Oct22

For the fourth session of this course, we are looking at the emergence of Reform Jewish political action.

Timeline of Reform Judaism (note: the Religious Action Center is founded in 1961)

A More Sociologically-Oriented History/Timeline

Why Advocacy is Central to Reform Judaism

Seeking "The Jewish Vote" goes back to 1868

A Critique of Reform Judaism's Political Involvement

About the...Read more...

Adult Ed: Money and Power

10/13/2023 03:46:58 PM

Oct13

For our third session on this topic, we will look at some history and sources for Jewish involvement in state politics, and how/why Jews care about democracy and political power.

Timeline of Jews in America

Intro to the book Jewish Power by J.J. Goldberg

Contemporary Jewish Politicians

Judaism and Democracy Source Sheet

a sort of confusingly structured source sheet on The Evolving Relationship Between...Read more...

Adult Ed: Money and Power

10/04/2023 03:19:08 PM

Oct4

For our first of five sessions on the topic of Money and Power, we used the source sheets and questions from Rabbi Avi Strausberg's guided lesson in the Project Zug booklet from Hadar.  We navigated questions on power and accountability, and on how to separate a person's deeds from their work (can a bigot write good books, can a lascivious man be a good rabbi or president, can we learn something useful from someone we don't...Read more...

Book Club: October

10/04/2023 03:15:09 PM

Oct4

On October 25 at 12pm, we will meet on Zoom to discuss our next pick for Book Club: The Rabbi Who Prayed with Fire by Rachel Sherona Lewis.

Congregation Beth Abraham expected their newest rabbi to "sing some songs and go to an environmental rally." But Vivian Green has other...Read more...

Book Club: September

09/10/2023 10:49:19 AM

Sep10

Our next book is Kantika by Elizabeth Graver. Our discussion will be September 27 at noon on Zoom.     A dazzling Sephardic multigenerational saga that moves from Istanbul to Barcelona, Havana, and New York, exploring displacement, endurance, and family as home.

A kaleidoscopic portrait of one family’s...Read more...

Book Club: August

07/26/2023 11:46:47 AM

Jul26

We will be discussing How to Make a Life by Florence Reisse Kraut via Zoom on August 30th at 10:30 AM.

 

 

When Ida and her daughter Bessie flee a catastrophic pogrom in Ukraine for America in 1905, they believe their emigration will ensure that their children...Read more...

Book Club: July

07/19/2023 07:26:57 PM

Jul19

We will be discussing Last Summer at the Golden Hotel by Elyssa Friedland.

The story revolves around a hotel in the Catskills and the two multigenerational families who own the once popular but now fading summer resort. Long buried secrets, intergenerational tensions emerge as a sell out...Read more...

Adult Ed: Messianism

05/31/2023 01:51:31 PM

May31

Join us Saturday, June 3rd, after Shacharit as we open up the conversation on Jewish views of the Messiah.

Sundays, June 11th and 18th, will be taught by a special guest teacher with expertise on this subject.

Some pre-readings on the subject:

Jewish Virtual Library's brief explanation of historical views about the Messiah

My Jewish Learning's selection of verses and quotes specifically about the Messiah...Read more...

Book Club: June

05/31/2023 01:31:12 PM

May31

Join us on Zoom at 10:30 the last Wednesday of every month. This month we are reading and discussing our next Book Club choice, The Thread Collectors by Shaunna Edwards and Alyson Richman.

The Thread Collectors: A Novel by [Shaunna J. Edwards, Alyson Richman]Read more...

Book Club: May

04/28/2023 10:09:25 AM

Apr28

Troubled by anti-Semitic acts against Jews and massacres, Dara Horn addresses these problems in her book People Love Dead Jews. We will meet via Zoom to discuss this book on May 31st at 10:30 a.m.  

A startling and profound exploration of how Jewish history is exploited to comfort the living. Renowned and...Read more...

Book Club: April

03/29/2023 11:29:52 AM

Mar29

On April 26th at 10:30 via Zoom we will meet to discuss The Ritual Bath by Faye Kellerman.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Detective Peter Decker of the LAPD is stunned when he gets the report....Read more...

Adult Ed: Sexual Ethics

03/15/2023 12:32:40 PM

Mar15

During class on Sunday, I kept searching for a citation in The Sacred Encounter and was having trouble finding it. After class, I found it in the chapter "Sex, Love, and the Androgynos" by Rabbi Elliot Kukla, who was the first openly transgender student to be ordained by Hebrew Union College.   Kukla starts his chapter with an excerpt from Mishnah Bikurim 4:1-2: An androgynos is in some respects legally equivalent to men, and in some...Read more...

Adult Ed: Sexual Ethics

03/08/2023 12:56:04 PM

Mar8

This month, we are studying Jewish sexual ethics through a Reform Lens. Using the book Sacred Encounter: Jewish Perspectives on Sexuality by the CCAR Press, and it's study guide (though in an abbreviated form), we are looking at the issues of Marriage, LGBTQIA inclusion, Healthy Relationships, Modesty in the Modern World, and Sexual Desire.

While folks are certainly welcomed to try to read along with me, Sacred Encounter is a bit dry...Read more...

Sat, November 2 2024 1 Cheshvan 5785