Saturday, December 1, 2012

What is the B'nei Mitzvah Revolution? - December 2012

Rabbi’s Column - December 2012

Re-thinking b’nai mitzvah so synagogues and their members can focus on what is most important about Jewish living and learning. - B’nai Mitzvah Revolution website

Temple Sholom, along with 13 other congregations, has been chosen to be part of a pilot cohort of the Union for Reform Judaism’s Campaign for Youth Engagement’s B’nai Mitzvah Revolution.  You may have seen publicity in the local Jewish papers, or from the URJ about this project, and I’d like to take this opportunity to explain what the project is, and what it means for our congregation.

Quite simply, the B’nai Mitzvah Revolution is the outgrowth of an idea by Dr. Isa Aron, of Hebrew Union College’s Rhea Hirsch School of Education.  Dr. Aron was one of the founders of the Experiments in Congregational Education (ECE) project, which resulted in congregations all over the United States (and outside) re-imagining themselves as “congregations of learners” - self-reflective congregations and, more concretely, the adoption of family-based education throughout the Jewish world.  The ECE project is what paved the way for us to create our pioneering Family Track/Trimester model.  Last year, Dr. Aron gathered together some of her colleagues and proteges (including our own Director of Education, Michelle Shapiro Abraham) to imagine her next project - finding a way to de-couple synagogue membership from being solely about what the child of the family needs to do to celebrate Bar/Bat Mitzvah.  After a follow-up meeting with Michelle and I, Dr. Aron scheduled a session at the URJ’s Biennial last December.  Newly installed URJ President Rabbi Rick Jacobs heard, and the project was adopted by the URJ as part of its Campaign for Youth Engagement.

Ironically, the project is attempting to de-emphasize the importance of Bar/Bat Mitzvah training as the defining part of synagogue membership by focusing on the process of becoming bar/bat mitzvah.  I encourage you to take a look at the BMR website (http://www.bnaimitzvahrevolution.org/) to see some of what is going on.  Different congregations are changing, refocusing, or tinkering their education and BM training to engage families, to encourage deeper involvement, and/or to make the ceremony and the process more meaningful to the families involved.

Our congregation is preparing more of a “meta”-experiment.  A group consisting of representatives from our Board of Education, Religious Practices committee, clergy and education staff has been meeting to imagine what we might do.  Three of us - Cantor Sharlein, Lainie Sokolsky and myself, went to the BMR’s pilot cohort retreat in the beginning of November to advance our process and find out how the BMR project would help us.

You can find more details about our process and our future plans on the Temple website, but here is a summary:

1)  Our first task is to inform the congregation what we are doing - of which this column is a first attempt.  Lainie Sokolsky reported to the November Board meeting and we will be holding a public information session at 11:30am on Sunday, December 16th at our Union Catholic site.

2) Our second task is to come up with a list of values that defines what a “Temple Sholom Bar/Bat Mitzvah” should be.  This is an aspirational list - and we will be holding open meetings in January to solicit the input of the congregation as a whole, as well as creating some type of survey to include those unable to attend the meetings.  A small group will then sort through that data to create a list of core values, which will go to the Board of Trustees for ratification.

3)  Our next task is experimentation - and more details on how that will happen will be forthcoming in January 2013.  We will be soliciting a small group of volunteer families from the current 6th grade class (about to begin their BM journey in January 2013), who are willing to take the time to learn more about bar/bat mitzvah and find ways to make the process and its celebration more meaningful - within the Temple Sholom community.

Until then - there is no need to panic.  Anyone currently in our Bar/Bat Mitzvah “pipeline” will be able to learn and to celebrate this lifecycle ceremony in the way that they have expected.  At this point, we are only asking for a small number of volunteers to pilot their own experiments.  The Board made sure that: 1) Any experiments will fit into the values of what a Temple Sholom bar/bat mitzvah is and has been.  There will be a group whose job will be to work with families to make sure their proposals are in line with the values outlined above. 2) Experiments may push our boundaries and make some feel uncomfortable, but they will not set precedents.  We may allow something once and decide it did not work for our community.

Already in this process, we have learned a number of lessons that will help improve the Bar/Bat Mitzvah experience - not only for the families involved, but for the whole congregation.  The question that we are using these experiences to answer is: Can we create a values based BM process which allows experimentation and still maintains a communal identity?

Finally, a personal note.  Thank you to the congregation for sharing with us the occasion of our daughter, Avital, becoming a Bat Mitzvah.  She was born in this congregation and we could think of no other community we would want to celebrate with.  Many members, who may not have been to many bar/bat mitzvah services recently, mentioned that there were things that were a part of Avital’s service that were special, probably because she was the rabbi’s daughter.  In truth, other than having another clergy member help lead the service, everything that Avital did to make leading the service a more meaningful experience - translating her Torah portion, working with the Cantor to choose certain melodies, inviting her (camp) friends up to lead the closing song - are all options that are available to any student or family in the congregation.  If all our participation in the BMR does is to bring that to the fore, than we will have accomplished something important and meaningful.

If you have any questions about the BMR, look to the pages on the Temple website, or feel free to speak to me, the Cantor, Lainie Sokolsky, Elissa Brown or Karen Schack (Board of Education, co-Presidents), Mark Nussenfeld (Religious Practices Chair).  If you are interested in being more involved in the process, just let our president, Sandra Nussenfeld know.

What is my goal in this process?  Last spring, at the Monday rehearsal for a Saturday service, I saw a student’s face break out in a huge grin as they held the Torah for the first time.  At that moment, it dawned on me.  That smile lasted all week, through the service, and the celebration afterward.  Each of our Temple Sholom b’nei mitzvah should have that experience.  The ritual with which they mark becoming a bar or bat mitzvah should be as enjoyable and as meaningful as the party that follows.  If we can get close to that goal, then we will more than be doing our part to carry a meaningful Judaism on to the next generation.

Friday, June 1, 2012

Libi b’mizrach - My heart is in the east

Libi b’mizrach - My heart is in the east. Yehudah haLevi

Later this month, our Director of Education and I will be leading the first Temple Sholom congregational trip to Israel (at least during my tenure as Rabbi).  It will be a small trip, my family, an extended family celebrating a grandparent’s upcoming 75th birthday, and the Temple Sholom trip co-chair, David Richmand.  It will hopefully be the first of many trips, perhaps every other year, to bring members of Temple Sholom to Israel to connect themselves with the land and people of Israel - our family in our ancient homeland.

This trip is not Temple Sholom’s first attempt to travel as a group to eretz Yisrael.  In the past, there have been many difficulties - who has been free to travel when and, of course, the cost.  All of us know how expensive air travel has become and traveling to and in Israel is even more costly during the busy tourist seasons.  So why is it worth the trip?

First of all, let us set aside the survival reason - the reason that BirthRight Israel uses to justify its push to get every Jewish young adult to travel to Israel (at no cost to them): Surveys and statistics have shown that a meaningful Israel experience tends to increase the rates of lifelong affiliation with Judaism.  Although this reason is important and a great impetus to get a huge number of people (including many of our Temple Sholom college students) to travel to Israel, it is not compelling to those of you reading this article.  After all, you are members of a synagogue already and, further, dedicated enough to actually read the monthly bulletin.  You are already affiliated.  You already make time and resources available for Judaism to be an important part of your life.

So, why travel to Israel?  Admittedly, the Reform movement has always had fundamental issues with the modern State of Israel and our relationship to that state.  One could argue (and I have) that Reform Judaism and Zionism were mutually conflicting answers to the question of how Jews should react to their emancipation in 18th and 19th century in Europe.  On the one hand, Reform Jews said that there was a way to be Jewish and be a fully integrated and participating citizen of the nation in which one lived.  That way was to push Judaism into the box of “religion” and eliminate all vestiges of nationality.  Zionism, a little later, came to the opposite conclusion: the best way for Jews to survive in Europe was to establish an actual nation for their national identity.  Only then would their rights and identity be respected in a nationalistic (and often Christian) Europe. Religion and ritual practice were left out of the consensus, but all groups agreed on a modern nation-state.  It was only in the 1930’s, when the dream of a sovereign state of Israel was near to becoming a reality, that the American Reform movement adopted a platform (The Columbus Platform of 1937) which allowed support for a Jewish State - and a large group split off because of this plank.  Our second ambivalence comes from how non-Orthodox Judaisms are treated in the current state of Israel.  There is a divide between the secular and the religious in Israel (not to be confused with the Ultra-Orthodox) and our “brand” of Judaism does not have any of the rights given to more Orthodox streams.  (That, by the way, is changing.  In late May, a Reform women Rabbi was acknowledged by the Attorney-General and added to the state payroll as a rabbi - like members of the Orthodox rabbinate.  See irac.org for more details.)

As Americans, we are also ambivalent about the Palestinian situation.  Most of our wars are fought overseas, so, excepting 9/11, we have little first-hand experience of the danger of attack on our own homes and persons.  Americans tend to root for the underdog, and we forget that this tiny geographic entity is surrounded by enemies who still refuse to treat with them.  Israel is a victim of its own success - military and economic.

However, the basic fact is that WE ARE JEWS.  Israel is the JEWISH STATE - the place where our story began, the place that we mention at the end of every seder and in every service.  There is, as there was not for two thousand years, an actual Israel to which we can and do refer.  Reading about Israel in the newspaper or on-line, watching reports on TV is not enough.  If we wish to put ourselves in relationship to the state of Israel; we need to meet and talk to Israelis, we need to see how and where they live; we need to breathe the air, eat the falafel, and stand on the ground where Abraham, Deborah, David, Huldah, Judah Maccabee, Hannah, Akiva, Maimonides, Joseph Caro, David ben Gurion (and even Madonna) have stood.  We need to create our own connections, through our own interactions and physical memories, if we want to create that bridge between Israelis and Jews in the Diaspora.  (Israelis need to do this too, as many do not understand why we would not just make aliyah and move to Israel if we wanted to be real Jews.)

We engage our Judaism in our family and in our community.  We are supported and learn more about who we are with others.  Our family and community in Israel is the same - we need to meet them to learn about ourselves.  We need to connect ourselves to Israel to understand how to be American Jews.

I look forward to all of us sharing our experiences when we return - and traveling with you on the next trip, or the next...

b’shanah haba’ah b’Yirushalayim - next year in Jerusalem?

Rabbi Abraham


Sunday, April 1, 2012

Join the Temple, Save the World

Asei l’cha rav, v’kanei l’cha chaver, v’hevei dan et kol ha’adam l’kaf z’chut
Make (for) yourself a teacher, acquire for yourself a friend, and judge each person for their merit.

-R. Yehoshua ben Perachya

As I write, I am on the Amtrak train returning from the Central Conference of American Rabbis’ convention in Boston.  Our final speaker was Robert Putnam, the author of Bowling Alone and, more recently American Grace.  In his conversation with us, Dr. Putnam shared the research that he had used for his book.  His focal point was that, uniquely, the United States is an exteremely religiously devout industrialized country, but also highly tolerant of other religions.  Usually, a country composed of highly devout, but many different religions is in chaos.  Instead, we are more tolerant of those of other religious beliefs than we are of those with differing political views.  In fact, a majority of Evangelical Christians believe that good people of other religions will be able to go to heaven, even when reminded that this is flatly contradicted by their stated theology.  

You may have heard about a side result of this data.  Individuals who are religious are nicer, live longer, and are more satisfied with their lives.  One might ask, what does “religious” mean?  (Especially considering the number of active, involved and very “Jewish” members of our congregation who come up to me and tell me they are not “religious”.)  For the purposes of the study, they used two or three questions.  The first was self-identification - do you belong to a religious group; if so, what group?  The second was attendance at religious services.  Consistently, across the religious and political spectrum, the results of “nice”-ness and satisfaction went up the more people reported they attended services.  

Don’t panic.  1)  You can still be nice if you do not regularly attend services.  2) The rabbi is not using this data, solely, to make a pitch for increased service attendance.  (Although, the data is pretty clear.)  Following up on this answer, the researchers looked deeper and found a correlation with the number of religious friends one had.  To restate, the more religious friends a person has, the more likely they are to be nice, and to be satisfied in their lives.  The connection is that the easiest place to make religious friends is in a religious community or institution.

So, if you have been waiting for the data, here it is - your participation in the Temple Sholom community is an act of tikkun olam and makes the world a better place.  Your willingness to attend Temple events, to make friends, and to maintain those friendships, not only makes it more likely that you will be satisfied in life, but also increases the likelihood that those friends will act nicely.  Small, but strong, warm and welcoming communities are the building blocks for a better society.

You belong to one.  You maintain and build it by your continued presence.  The more that you are present - the better the world is for you and for others.

See you soon,

Rabbi Abraham

Sunday, January 1, 2012

A Moment to Kvell...

Just before I began this month of sabbatical, I attended the Union for Reform Judaism’s Biennial in Washington DC.  Usually, I do not go to the Biennial unless we have a congregational delegation going as well.  This gathering of the Reform movement’s congregational arm is mainly not designed for Jewish professionals, but for the volunteer leaders of congregations.  I like to go as support to our delegation and, as Susan Sedwin and Sally Isaacs put it when we were at the Biennial in Houston, to be their “personal rabbi” in services, classes, etc.  This year, I was planning to attend anyway, because of the Campaign for Youth Engagement (see the Director of Education’s article).  Michelle and I were also asked to lead one of the four Thursday morning services from the prayerbook that we edited (Mishkan Tfilah Journal).
In the event, I experienced one of the great joys of my rabbinate so far.  As I have often said, one of the things that most fulfills me as a rabbi is sharing lifecycle events with families in the congregation – being there for weddings and funerals, brit ceremonies, b’nei mitzvah and confirmation.  At the Biennial in DC, I discovered a new joy – a pride in my congregants as they engaged in the larger Reform Jewish community.
Because of a wonderful article that she wrote with Jackie Lieberman, Shelly Glaser-Freedman was invited to present at a session on Temple Sholom’s Women on Their Own group.  In support, Claire Bisgay and Marjorie Cohen traveled with her, and she did a great job representing the group, Temple Sholom, and small congregations in general.  Their takeaway from the session, where Shelly was joined on the dais by professionals from large congregations, was that Temple Sholom manages to do with volunteers  what larger congregations have to hire staff to do.
Our current president, Susan Sedwin, and 1st vice president, Sandra Nussenfeld, were also there to represent the congregation.  We all know it takes a great deal of dedication and time away from family to be an officer, but it takes another level to use vacation time and personal savings to spend time away from home, learning about how our Temple can thrive and getting excited about where we are in our larger movement.
I will admit, however, that my proudest moment was when I realized that we had four people at the Biennial at whose confirmation I had officiated.  Ted Dreier, who is now working as our Religious School Administrator while he awaits the answer to his application to Hebrew Union College’s Rhea Hirsch School of Education in Los Angeles (Michelle’s alma mater), attended the CYE as well as a special invitation-only meeting on re-imagining Bar/Bat Mitzvah with HUC’s Dr. Isa Aron.  Rebekah Sedwin, who has been our youth group advisor and religious school teacher, also attended the CYE.  Stephanie Fields, who taught in our religious school and is now the Family and Teen Educator at the Temple in Atlanta, came with her congregational team and Heather Stoloff, former SPANCY president, came down from Brandeis.  The point of the Campaign for Youth Engagement is finding ways to keep our young congregants active in their own Jewish lives through their adulthood.  To see four of our former students, not only active, but taking on the leadership role of participating in this debate was a m’chayah (inspiration, lit. “life-giver” – Yiddish) for me as their rabbi.

Sitting in Shabbat morning t’fillah with them, kvelling, I also realized something else.  In this congregation, we are leaders – and have some control over what happens and the direction the congregation is heading.  In the greater community of the URJ, we are congregants.  We have the same concerns about (MUM) dues, whether the leadership is acting in our best interest, and where we fit in the huge structure.  Just like at Temple Sholom, there are people that we know very well (three of our past student Cantors – Darcie Naomi Sharlein, Hayley Kobilinsky Poserow, and Shira Nafshi send their best wishes) and those that we do not. We all share the same community and the same goals, and the same frustrations.  Just like we gather together once or twice a year to worship together at the High HolyDays, and once a year to confirm our goals – at the annual congregational meeting; so does the Union for Reform  Judaism gather every two years to worship together and to dream.
As I continue to be inspired by our congregation, so am I reinvigorated and inspired by those I had a hand in teaching – our former student Cantors, our confirmands, and our Temple leaders, who have given of themselves to dream a new future not just for Temple Sholom, but for Reform Judaism as well.

See you on the 20th.