Ruth Messinger

The unbelievable experience that I had last summer in Ghana as part of a rabbinic delegation with American Jewish World Service  (AJWS) already feels so long ago, yet I will never forget those ten days living in an amazing community worlds away. The trip opened my eyes to a much bigger world and challenged me to think how far my circle of obligation extends.

The visionary behind this remarkable organization and its president is Ruth Messinger, who spent a few powerful days with us in the small, desperately poor fishing village called Sankor in Ghana. We have the privilege of hosting her here in Boulder in the second weekend of June.

Congregations Bonai Shalom and Nevei Kodesh are co-hosting a Friday night program at Bonai Shalom with Ruth Messinger and she will also be speaking during services on Shabbat morning.

On Friday, June 8 during Friday night services, starting at 6:00 pm, Ruth will give a short D’var Torah  followed at 7:00 pm when Ruth will be talking about “Fighting Hunger in a World of Plenty: A Grassroots Approach”, an opportunity to learn about the politics behind the global hunger crisis. Speaking from her own experiences in the developing world, Ruth will propose how American Jews can influence our government to address the root causes of hunger and poverty, and put an end to the world’s growing hunger problem from the ground up. Reservations are required for this dinner and we expect to sell out.

After dinner, at approximately 8:00 pm, there will be a talk open to everyone, “Jews as Global Citizens: Our Responsibility in the World.” This will be a lecture followed by a Q&A. Ruth will discuss the role of “Jews as Global Citizens.” Sharing the words of dedicated Jews from communities across the United States — college and rabbinical students, community leaders and skilled professionals — Ruth will tell of the enormous transformative impact volunteering and advocacy can make in the modern era. By embracing our obligation to assist all people in need, regardless of race, religion or nationality, we have the capacity to ensure social justice for coming generations. As Jews who take seriously our role as global citizens, we will contribute to tikkun olam, the fixing of the world.

Shabbat morning services begin at 9:30 am on Saturday, June 9th and Ruth will be giving the sermon at approximately 11:30 am.

Dinner Reservations: $15 per adult, $12 per child (under 12 years old), $50 maximum per family. Reservations for dinner must be made in advance by Wednesday, June 6th. To make reservations please email info@bonaishalom.org. No reservations required for other events and services

We hope you will join us for what promises to be an extraordinary and inspiring Shabbat with our special guest.

Boulder’s Hebrew High teens will be joining Haver and the community at Congregation Bonai Shalom tonight for the Yom HaShoah Service of Commemoration, starting at 7:30 pm.  For more information about the service, please read this earlier BJN post about the event.

Will you be there?  See you tonight!

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Less than a week after Passover has finished, Yom HaShoah, our annual commemoration of the Holocaust, appears on our Jewish calendar. This year we invite you to our community-wide service on Wednesday, April 18th at 7:30 pm at Congregation Bonai Shalom.  Join three mothers and daughters, first, second and third generation survivors, in conversation: Irene Rosenschein and her daughter Beverly, Doris Small and her daughter Miriam and Rabbi Ori Har and her daughter Lael will share impressions of memory and legacy. The service is sponsored by Haver, Boulder’s Rabbinic Fellowship, and will include liturgical reflections and music along with the dialogue and discussion.

In commemoration of all the books burned in the Shoah, we will end our program with a Jewish book exchange. Please bring a Jewish book to pass on and take a different one home with you.

We are blessed and enriched by the continuing presence of survivors in our Boulder Jewish community and we hope that many will join this important event to honor them along with the memories of the six million.

The Mitzvot of Purim are: 1. To hear the Megillah (we have three opportunities at Bonai Shalom) 2. Matanot la’evyonim – Gifts to the Poor. We will be collecting money for this at our Megillah readings, as well as auctioning off our Mac ‘n’ Cheese groggers, most of which we will be delivering directly to Community Food Share on Purim morning. 3. Mishloach Manot – Food Gifts to Friends and Neighbors, which is covered by our amazing Happy Purim Project, as well as the personal gifts we give to each other. 4. Se’udat Purim – A Festive Purim Meal, traditionally held in the afternoon of Purim. Although we do not have an official one at Bonai Shalom this year, we encourage you to join with others for such festivities!

Here is a full schedule of events for this Purim:

Purim 5772/2012

Wednesday March 7

Fast of Esther – Begins at 5:03 am ends at 6:27 pm

5:45 pm – Purim Shelanu, a fun, interactive Purim program for 0-5s and their parents, including a retelling of the story with Rabbi Marc and Esther’s Dance Party

6:30 pm – Costume Parade with prizes for all who are dressed up!

7:00pm-9:ish – Teen Lounge, staffed by Hebrew High, snacks by Shushan Catering

6:45 pm – Maariv (evening service)

7:00 pm – Traditional Megillah Reading

8:ish – Crazy Purim Shtick with MC McPhee

Thursday March 8

7:00 am – Shacharit (Morning Service), followed by Megillah Reading, read by Yossi Shlossberg (approximately 8:00 am)

2:00 pm – Womens’ Megillah Reading with Morah Yehudis Fishman

All events listed at Bonai Shalom

Wishing everyone a joyful, conscious Purim!
Rabbi Marc

Services start at 6pm, dinner at 7pm and a talk and discussion at 8pm about how faith communities should be addressing issues of food and hunger, followed by dessert. Although the dinner is sold out, we have extended our deadline to RSVP by 24 hours for the talk and dessert. RSVP by 5pm Wednesday February 29th.

Please join us at Bonai Shalom on Friday March 2nd for “Food, Faith, and Hunger,” a conversation among Congressman Jared Polis, Hazon representative Becky O’Brien, and Rabbi Marc Soloway.

This event is the kick-off of Bonai Shalom’s Food Challenge, a month-long program focusing on the food justice issues of poverty, hunger, and waste. (For information on the Food Challenge email foodchallenge@bonaishalom.org)
Dinner, talk, and dessert $15/person; Talk and dessert $10/person. Space is limited, reservations and prepayment necessary for this event. For information and reservations email office@bonaishalom.org or call 303-442-6605

Irene and her sisters were always known as the vier shwester, the four sisters, who all survived the Holocaust and remained together throughout the nightmare in the ghetto, three concentration camps, including Auschwitz, and a Displaced Persons’ camp; they were never separated during these unspeakable horrors. Until last night, all four sisters were still alive, and our hearts go out to Irene and the rest of the family on this very sad loss.

Irene will be sitting shiva from Sunday until Wednesday morning and the family have requested shiva calls only from 1:00 pm – 8:00 pm.

There will be three shiva minyanim for ma’ariv on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday evenings at 6:00 pm at Irene’s home.

Irene keeps a strictly Kosher home and has indicated to me that she is fine and does not want meals provided at this time, but people are encouraged to bring simple food like fruit and Kosher cake for the shiva home. Irene has specifically asked for nothing beyond this, but thanks everybody in advance for their love and support.

Shalom al nishmat Esther bat Yisroel v’Bluma Hendel – Peace on Esther’s soul. Hamakom y’nachem – May God grant comfort and strength to Irene along with all the other mourners of Israel.

Blessings,

Rabbi Marc

Written as a clear promotion of Orthodox Judaism and a subtle attack on the other denominations, Rabbi Goldfeder, who really is my friend by the way, falls into some very dangerous and murky waters in defending a Judaism whose name means “the right way to think,” and therefore implies that anyone who thinks and acts differently is wrong. This “right-way-to-think Judaism” has, in my view, allowed and even promoted, unspeakably wrong and immoral acts in the world, including abuse of animals and workers, profound gender warfare, culminating in spitting on and verbally abusing a 12-year-old girl in Israel, extreme homophobia and the incitement of hateful racism in an endless series of statements and actions by Orthodox rabbis in Israel.

I am not, for even one moment, suggesting that Rabbi Goldfeder and the Aish Kodesh community does any of these things and I know that he (and hopefully they) are equally appalled by them. I am, however, challenging the assumption that Orthodox Judaism = right and non-Orthodox = wrong. This is borne out neither historically, morally nor educationally. The notion that there has always somehow been only one correct way of being Jewish and that any other expression of Judaism is an aberration shows a lack of knowledge of our history and our sociology. True, contemporary Jews are all descendants of rabbinic Judaism, which was an ingenious paradigm shift that allowed continuity and survival after the destruction of the Temple in the year 70CE, but in its inception, this Judaism included a multiplicity of voices.

I do not claim for a second that Conservative Judaism is the only right way, in thought or in practice, but I do believe that it is an authentic, if imperfect, expression and interpretation of that rabbinic Judaism, integrating halacha (Jewish law) and modernity with a considerable amount of intellectual honesty, even if it is sometimes clumsy and a little too dry. Conservative Judaism has never defined itself outside Jewish Law, but has rather followed the tradition of the rabbis of the Talmud in recognizing that there are times when that law changes, when its original context has changed.

In my view, Orthodoxy has again and again taken the category of pattur (meaning exempt) and changed it into assur (meaning forbidden.) For instance, there are sources that clearly allow women certain ritual roles, including being called up to the Torah, but does not obligate them, which eventually led to strict prohibitions and gender separation that some scholars assert was not always the case. This is one example in which Conservative Judaism allowed halacha to evolve, just as it had in other areas of law in the past.

Rabbi Goldfeder implied in his article that we, whoever we are, are somehow only putting our energy as activists into issues of global poverty in the developing world and environmentalism while ignoring the plight of Jews. Well, where is he and his community every Passover, Rosh HaShanah and Hanukkah when I, along with dozens of my congregants and members of other shuls run programs for Jewish seniors in conjunction with Jewish Family Services? Our Hesed Initiative provides hundreds of meals and visits to members of our community in pastoral need.

The Torah, in my reading of it, so clearly and strongly demands of us that we also must have concern for the stranger, for the vulnerable in our world, for the hungry, outside our own. An Orthodoxy that promotes Jewish welfare only to serve other Jews, especially in a world where there is considerable affluence in some Jewish communities, and that we ignore the plight of millions of starving children, also God’s creatures, is a damaging misreading of the Torah that I hold sacred; a Torah that demands of me that I have compassion for God’s creatures in their suffering.

I have been to too many events within the Orthodox community, ok excepting Aish Kodesh, where 100s and 100s of Styrofoam cups, plastic plates and cutlery are thrown out, destined for landfills to leach their toxins into our rivers. Is this “right Judaism” when our Torah and rabbinic tradition so clearly demand of us that we are guardians of this earth? The statement that we liberal Jews are somehow only concerned with ‘trivial’ matters, like our planet’s survival and humanity dying of starvation and curable diseases from unclean water, while we ignore the plight of our Jewish brothers and sisters, is so absurd.

Yes, I was twice co-chair of Hazon’s Jewish Food Conference, looking at issues of health and sustainability around our food system, while some so-called Kosher food continues to poison us and is too often corrupt in its production; yes, I went to Ghana last summer with AJWS and worked with an NGO rescuing children as young as six from slavery. It is precisely my love and my connection to Judaism and my reading of Torah that obligates me to do this, not some wishy-washy liberal version of it that betrays our tradition.

I passionately believe in a pluralism that places real value on the different expressions of Jewish life and I actually love Aish Kodesh and its rabbi and really want that community to succeed and grow, as I am so grateful for the depth of Torah and the fervent connection to mitzvot and authenticity that emanates from those walls. I also am so grateful for and indebted to the Reform movement, in which both Rabbi Goldfeder and I were raised, and which has contributed so much to the world in its prophetic vision of social justice and we are blessed with powerful and wonderful Reform Rabbis in Boulder to continue that vision. I also feel connected to the accessible spirituality and depth that has emerged from Jewish Renewal. I am comfortable in my discomfort as a rabbi and teacher of Conservative Judaism, but I will never, ever claim that it is the right and only authentic expression of Judaism.

Leave the monkey outside and let’s get a beer.