Jewish community
What It Was Like To Grow Up Multiracial and Orthodox in a Hasidic Enclave
They were older than me, by at least five years, and I was afraid. Though my Satmar Hasidic neighbors were ...
A Hanukkah Lesson for Our Turbulent Political Times
As we approach our upcoming Festival of Lights, our stories about the Maccabees and our nation’s triumph over religious and ...
From Looking Jewish to Being Jewish
Cultural anthropologists call it ‘going native’. You find yourself in the field as a participant observer of your host culture ...
18 Years in the Rabbinate – 18 Lessons Learned
I love being a rabbi. I cannot imagine doing or being anything else. I am proud of my work for ...
Dealing with a New Place
Last Thursday my family moved to a new house. I love our new house. It’s beautiful, bigger than the old ...
City Mouse, Country Mouse: Is Jewish Continuity a Fable?
I’m a city girl from North America, used to big city Judaism. I have grown up and worked in cities ...
Jewish Identity: Asking the Wrong Question
I have been thinking a lot about Jewish identity recently. How do we define our own connection to Judaism? What ...
Jewish Learning Beyond New York: Jewish Learning Everywhere With @OpenSinai
When I was in my final year of rabbinical school I had a remarkable opportunity to spend a weekend in ...
Rabbi Laura’s Day Off (or: Outreach Happens)
Our 21 year old daughter has invited her parents to The Intention Gathering, a “self-sustaining, all-ages, ethnically diverse superfragilistic-art-dance-creative community.”We have ...
Talking about Rabbis
Yesterday, during preparations for the graduation ceremony for the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, I caught a glimpse of the glow on the ...