Jewish Tradition commands us to respect our bodies and to strive for health as a means of honoring our relationship to God. Discover Reform Jewish perspectives on important topics related to health and wellness.
What Jewish Tradition Says About Health and Wellness
Sh'mirat haguf – literally, guarding the body – is the religious imperative to take care of our body and soul. Learn how you can fulfill this mitzvah.
Disabilities and Special Needs
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Five Ways to Be an Ally to People with Disabilities
This month, as we highlight disability inclusion and work toward disability inclusion in our Jewish communities all year long, here are five easy ways to be an individual ally to people with disabilities.
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The Bar Mitzvah of Benjamin Avi Faber
Like most parents, from the time we gave birth to our son, we had many hopes and dreams for him. We wanted him to have a good education, have friends and grow up to live a happy and prosperous life.
Podcast: Planning Ahead for Parents of Children with Special Needs
Dr. Erenberg shares what she believes every parent of a child with special needs should hear, and how the Jewish community can support families with special needs.
Podcast: Let's Talk About Special Needs
Learn about the important aspects of parenting children with special needs, what parents are feeling, what educators need to know, the importance of transparency, and who can help.
Bioethics
Organ Donation: Heaven Knows We Need Them Here!
By and large, the Jewish legal tradition has never opposed organ donation. For nearly 2,000 years, it has laid the groundwork in favor of such actions. And the Reform Movement has supported and encouraged it for many years now.
Serious Illness
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A Torah for Cancer
Torah is as much a part of my treatment for an aggressive form of prostate cancer as are the drugs, the radiation, and the love and support of my family and friends.
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Stem Cell Wonders
In January 2008, Dr. Doris Taylor and her colleagues at the University of Minnesota's Center for Cardiovascular Repair took the heart from the cadaver of a rat and injected it with stem cells, bringing it to life-and making history. She spoke with Krista Tippett, host of Krista Tippett on Being
My Cancer and God: A Final Work Unfinished
I have written over and over again that the purpose of prayer is to change us, not to change God. How has this theology stood up to my current medical crisis? As I had requested, my physicians were impeccably honest. Before surgery: "Due to excessive barium residual from your upper G.I. tests, we
The Power of Prayer, Ritual and Tradition: Reflections from a Caregiver
On August 1, 1998, I started a diary with the words ‘Today Harvey signed the papers which placed him in hospice…This is my hospice diary. Will I be able to keep it up? Will I be able to help him get through this experience? Can I possibly come out alive on the other end? The answer to all of that is - only God knows...So together, my darling husband of 49 years and I started a journey. A journey which would find each of us in a very different place at the end.
Body and Soul
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The Purpose of Kashrut
The laws of kashrut offer a Jewish spiritual discipline that is rooted in the concrete choices and details of daily life--to be practiced in an area that seems most "mundane." In fact, part of the beauty of kashrut is that regardless of our age, personal interests, or geographic location, we all eat, and most of us do so several times a day.
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Life at Its Highest
A meditative study of our texts can allow us to decrease the separation between the sacred words on the page and ourselves. Unlike cognitive understanding, which assumes that the object to be understood is separate from the person engaged in the understanding, meditation supports a kind of knowing that sees the object and the person as one.
Pregnancy
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Out of the Shadows: An Infertility Story
I longed so be a mother, but when faced with my own infertility, I began to see the biblical story of Sarah and Hagar in a new light.
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During Pregnancy
A prayer for prospective parents.