With Wounds Still Open, We Ask: Where is God?
Your Guide to Fasting (or Not) on Yom Kippur
Being Different Is What Being Human Is All About
As we welcome guests this Sukkot, the sole label we should place on each other is an inclusive one: we are individuals with diverse needs.
The Enemy Within Our Military
For years, members of the United States military were fighting a silent, internal battle: sexual assault was rampant and the military was covering it up.
Title IX Protects Students
Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, a comprehensive federal law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex under any educational program or activity receiving federal funding,
What Jewish Tradition Says About Health and Wellness
Outraged Reform Jewish Leaders to Israeli PM: Denounce Degrading Body Searches of Female Rabbinic Students at Kotel
Senior leadership of the Reform Movement, the largest movement in Jewish life, sent a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in response to unnecessary and demeaning body searches imposed on female rabbinic students at the Western Wall in Jerusalem:
Dear Prime Minister Netanyahu,
We are writing to express our outrage and dismay about the humiliation of a cohort of Reform rabbinic students, all of whom are the future leadership of the Jewish people, at the entrance to the Kotel on August 23rd, Rosh Hodesh Elul.
Two of our female rabbinic students, who are spending their first year of studies in Israel, were stopped at the entrance to the Kotel. After they passed through a metal detector (which clearly indicated that they were not posing any security threat), they were asked to lift their skirts and shirts in a demeaning way, an action that completely defied the decisions the Supreme Court reached on this matter.
How I Re-Lit the Flame of Youth Engagement (By Leaving During the Busiest Week of the Year)
In the last week of September, just days before Rosh Hashannah, more than 50 youth professionals gathered at the picturesque URJ Kutz Camp in the heart of the Hudson Valley for a few days of learning and growing. The retreat was part of a pilot for the Youth Professionals 101 Community of Practice, a new cohort for congregational youth professionals in the first two years of our roles to learn best practices for youth engagement and build a network.
L’dor V’dor: From Adults, to Teens, to Kids, Camp Shalom Inspires
Seeing, Learning, Doing: My First Few Months as the URJ's Presidential Fellow
I don’t have all of the answers about how to accomplish the challenge of engaging Jewish millennials, but here are three of the insights I have gained from simple conversations with them.