Soul Food is back for a discussion about philanthropy on Thursday, November 12th at 7:00 pm. Unfortunately, Rabbi Gavriel and Rabbi Josh won’t be joining us, but we can still have an elevated conversation about a challenging subject in the Jewish and secular world.

Is it acceptable for us to simply give to charity or should our giving be an avenue for social change? How do we choose to whom we give? What does it mean to “give Jewishly”? As Jews, is it our responsibility to give to Jewish causes at home and abroad or does all charity cover the mitzvah of giving tzedakah?

These are some of the topics we will grapple with during our conversation. This is not a fundraiser – just a discussion about how we think about charitable giving as emerging leaders in the community.

Shari Edelstein will facilitate the evening. Shari has a passion for promoting social change, more than two decades experience in philanthropy, in the United States and Israel, and extensive experience assessing and evaluating nonprofits, grant making, capacity building, strategic planning, program design and management. Shari is currently building a model for community based interfaith giving circles (empowered philanthropy) to support pro-solution efforts addressing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Olive Branch Giving Circles will be testing the model with a pilot program in Boulder in the first half of 2016. The three minute video on this link gives a good overview of the concept. http://jewcer.com/project/people-philanthropy-peace.

Please contact Karli Sherwinter at kkreindler@yahoo.com to RSVP. Address provided upon RSVP.

Funding for this program was provided by Soul Food. Soul Food’s mission: Bringing radical Jewish culture to Boulder to stimulate dialogue for those in search of authentic Jewish identity.