Category: Convention

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Convention

Learning and Connecting at CCAR Convention 2019

I stood as I’ve done thousands of times before with my eyes closed concentrating on the words, Shema Yisrael Adonai Eloheinu Adonai Echad! Except this time it was different. I was leading my congregation on a recent Friday night and for the first time during this moment of introspection a terrifying thought emerged, “what if? What if a perpetrator at this exact moment decides to enter like at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh because at this moment I am vulnerable, I am not paying attention to my surroundings?” This thought was quickly followed, “what is this world coming to?”

This is a question that I know I am not alone in considering. At the upcoming Convention in Cincinnati, we will take the time to delve deep into the issues of our day like antisemitism, security protocols, Torah learning, professional development, and so much more. It will also be the first time for many of us that we will share the stories and learn best practices from others as we debrief our communities response to the Pittsburgh Massacre. There will be sessions like, “Recovering from Moral Injury: Textual and Ritual Resources for Care,” “Lessons from Parkland and Northern California,” and “The Realities of Hate Online,” where we will be able to learn from experts and take new insights and practices back to our own communities.

In particular, I am looking forward to hearing from Attorney Roberta Kaplan. While known for her work on United States v. Windsor, the case that led to the end of the Defense of Marriage Act, Kaplan has a new case. Sines v. Kessler accuses the organizers of the Charlottesville’s march of conspiring to bring a campaign of violence under a pretext of a peaceful exercise of free speech. As Kaplan says “DOMA ‘was about the equal dignity of gay people…The Charlottesville case is also about equal dignity. It’s just about different groups of people.’”[1] There will surely be information and experiences to glean from Kaplan that will help those of us fortunate to attend to convention to consider and to share with our colleagues, institutions, and communities.

Most importantly, there will be opportunities, as abundant as one wishes to make them, for sharing stories, connecting with others, and hopefully, healing. In today’s world, we need to be together. While just a few days time, the annual Convention is a time to recharge one’s rabbinic batteries. We will take the opportunities, both formal and informal, to listen to one another, to ask the hard questions, share our fears, and make plans to move forward together. I hope that you will join me. Register now.

[1] Chernikoff, Helen. “Madam Precedent.” The Forward Magazine. (July 13, 2018): 26-31.

—

Rabbi Eleanor Steinman serves Temple Beth Hillel in Valley Village, California.

 

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Convention

Fifty Year Reflections

In many ways, the Reform movement is quite different today than it was when I was ordained. The Union Prayer Book was used in our synagogues universally most of the service was conducted in English. The introduction of Gates of Prayer, Gates of Repentance, and most recently, Mishkan T’fillah and Mishkan HaNefesh brought with it a more traditional feel while adding optional readings that fill the worship with meaning. Gender inclusive language makes all feel a part of the worship.

As students at HUC-JIR, we could not wear a Tallit when conducting services and students who desired kosher food needed the permission of the president to live off campus. My first contract in Akron specified that I could not wear a kippah on the bimah. Now kippot and talliot are made available to the congregation and the Tallit has replaced the robe that was standard attire for rabbis in the pulpit.

Our movement is no longer “classical reform.” More and more, our congregants and our younger colleagues pushed our movement to embrace traditions that had been discarded. We embraced Zionism and Israel became part of our rabbinic training and central in our congregations. I, too, embrace these changes. What’s lacking is the notion that the synagogue is central to Jewish life. Today there is much that competes and Friday night is no longer “Temple night.” We talk of spirituality without including the synagogue experience as an essential component of our relationship with God. I now hear people tell me that they are spiritual, but not religious. We can be both and I hope the worship service will once again rise up as part of our search for God in our lives.

In 1969, there were no women yet ordained by the College-Institute. There had not yet been ordained an openly LGTBQ rabbi. Women rabbis have become part of the norm, as have LGBTQ rabbis. The inclusion of both in our rabbinic leadership has changed us for the better.

In the early 1990’s, those of us with LGBT children and our colleagues who identified as gay or lesbian (mostly in the closet) were not permitted to post a meeting in a colleague’s room. Today most of our members are comfortable with officiating at same sex weddings. Our movement has become more welcoming of a diverse population making many more comfortable in our synagogues. I was happy to be a part of that change. I recall the controversy that arose when I officiated at the first same sex Jewish wedding in Ohio.   We have led the way and for that we should be proud.

Every generation makes its contribution to the growth of Reform Judaism. I look back on my career with a sense of satisfaction. It is good to know that I have made a difference in the lives of many people. It is good to know that, both in my congregation and as national president of PFLAG, I have made LGBTQ people feel safe, helped their families embrace them, and helped make them feel a part of Jewish religious life.  It is good to know that I have been able to teach both Jews and non-Jews the lessons that come from our Jewish tradition and its literature. It is good to continue to be a part of the general community and continue to present to Christian and Muslim groups. It is good now to be a member of my congregation. I now learn from my rabbi, and for that I am grateful.

—

Rabbi David M Horowitz is celebrating 50 years in the rabbinate at the upcoming 2019 CCAR Convention. 

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Convention

The First Time I Was a Rabbi

The first time I was a rabbi happened in a small town in West Virginia. It was not what I had expected. I’m pretty sure it was 1965 but I am certain it was Yom Kippur because Jan Peerce, the great operatic tenor, sang Kol Nidre.

I had just found out I was going to be the rabbi there only a few days earlier.

At the time, I was in my second-year of rabbinic school (age 22) and didn’t even rate a High Holyday student pulpit. That year there were only a few but I had missed the cut-off in the student-pulpit lottery.

Then, just two days before Yom Kippur, the student who had been assigned to conduct High Holyday services in Logan, West Virginia was taken ill and confined to bed. Since I was next on the list, within only a few hours, I found myself standing in the hallway outside a sick classmate’s bedroom taking notes:

You take the Norfolk & Western to Huntington. Then you rent a car and drive through the mountains to Logan. There will be a room reserved for you at the hotel. When you get in, phone a mister so-and-so and tell him you’re the replacement rabbi. He’ll tell you where the synagogue is. Services begin at 7.

He gave me his prayer book, marked with all the cues for the organist and the choir, and explained that, when it came time for the chanting of the Kol Nidre prayer, I should reach under the lectern where, hopefully, there would be a phonograph ready to play a recording of Jan Peerce (nee: Jacob Pincus Perelmuth) singing Kol Nidre.

“Have you decided what you’re preaching on yet?” my classmate asked.

Preaching? It hadn’t yet even dawned on me that I was supposed to give a sermon!

Nervous would be an understatement. I was terrified.

Within two days, on the holiest day of the year, I found myself standing up on the bima leading a congregation in prayer. Everything went pretty much according to plan until we got to the shema. (I am not making this up.)

Before I could invite the congregation to rise—as per the dramaturgical instructions written in my prayer book—I felt a slight rumbling in the floor of the building and heard a distant roaring sound. Then the chandeliers began slowly swinging back and forth. At first, I thought it might be an earthquake. But the rumbling and the roar steadily increased. Soon, the whole building shook. The noise was deafening. Maybe I was having a mystical experience. I can only imagine what the expression on my face must have looked like.

But—and this is the crazy part—no one else in the congregation seemed to take any notice at all. Some began casually whispering to one another. Others simply closed their eyes and seemed to be meditating. Excuse me but does anyone else hear this loud roar? Pardon me, but are we concerned that the building is violently shaking? Perhaps I had slipped into an Isaac Bashevis Singer short story and a village whose inhabitants had become inured to the earth shaking and the heavens roaring whenever they declared God’s unity.

Thankfully, a member of the congregation, recognizing my dismay, came up onto the stage with a whispered explanation: A few feet behind the back wall of the synagogue—he inconspicuously gestured, right behind the five-member choir—was the main line of the Chesapeake & Ohio railroad’s coal division and, as it happened, every now and then, a two hundred car-long coal train passed by.

Fifteen minutes later, when the rumble and roar faded off into the distance, we continued our worship: Hear, O’ Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One.

That winter, in my Hebrew Bible class, we read I Kings 19:12. “And after the roar there was the thin, barely audible sound of almost breathing.”

—

Rabbi Lawrence Kushner is celebrating 50 years in the rabbinate at the upcoming 2019 CCAR Convention. 

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Convention

Reflections on 50 Years in the Rabbinate

Probably the greatest change in my life was the day Dr. Alvin Reines defined religion in Philosophy class as: “Man’s response to his finitude, his infinite striving and his finite factuality.” His elongated explanation changed my life due to the fact that for years I had struggled with my father’s suicide when I was 10 years old. Suddenly I had a cause and a mission to my life. I could bring comfort to the bereaved and a repurpose to those dealing with the death of a loved one. My life’s path suddenly took me on an adventure of trying to assist youth and adults preparing for the inevitability of the death and to reconcile this loss through mourning customs. A piece of this exploit took me into the world of teenage suicide and its devastating and profound impact on everyone; parents, fellow students and the community. My quest became as to what contribution I could make to prevent the next suicide? Utilizing members of my congregation, together we produced a video and called it Inside I Ache. This described not only the warning signs of suicide but that friends knowingly must break a confidence and tell someone in authority when they recognize such signs. This video began my adventure into the world of thanatology and my writing about death and dying issues, i.e. my book on Clergy Retirement: Every Ending a New Beginning, or The Suicide Funeral.

My rabbinate was also dedicated to offering a wide range of spiritual experiences through services filled with music and a sense of holiness and awe. We were once dubbed ‘the hugging congregation’ and awarded 4 stars by a newspaper reporter who made it his mission to go around and rate congregations in Cleveland. I also have a deep love of teaching adults and young people and have felt a sense of satisfaction by inspiring 9 of my students to become rabbis. I was highly involved in social action projects and perhaps felt most rewarded with the yearly observance of both Martin Luther King Jr’s birthday and the yahrsite of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. Our Temple and Antioch Baptist Church, a large, prominent church in Cleveland yearly held a MLK service and other discussions. As a result of this interaction, their pastor, the Rev. Marvin McMickle and I became the best of friends. I was invited to speak at each of his milestone celebrations at his congregation, and he at mine, and was prominently involved when he ran for the U.S. Senate. During my thirty-five years with Temple Emanu El, I led them to work cooperatively with other congregations and personally developed a community adult education program and a joint high school. I have a deep commitment to Israel and am on the local Jewish National Fund Board of Directors, as well as having served for many years on the National Rabbinic Board for Israel Bonds and am a member of AIPAC. I have lived in Israel twice for a year a piece and have traveled there about 30+ times. Prior to my retirement from Temple Emanu El, I positioned the congregation to make the transition to a new building in a suburb closer to where many young Jewish couples were living.   On a lighter note I have twice been dubbed Cleveland’s “Funniest Rabbi” at the bi-annual fundraising event at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage.

I have continued my involvement in Judaism through serving as a monthly rabbi in Sharon, PA for 10 years, as an interim rabbi in Lexington, KY, and as a High Holy Day replacements in Rochester, NY, Virginia Beach, VA and Birmingham, AL, as well as being a rabbi on cruise ships that have taken us to Antarctica, India, Indonesia and the United Arab Emirates. We have traveled to Africa, Australia, Alaska and Vietnam.

Elaine and my children number 5 with one daughter living here in Cleveland, three sons in Denver and one son on Long Island. We have 9 grandchildren spread around the country and no great grandchildren as of this writing in 2019.

It has been a wonderful and meaningful life being a rabbi and if I could choose it over again I would do it in a heartbeat.

—

Rabbi Daniel A. Roberts is celebrating 50 years in the rabbinate at the upcoming 2019 CCAR Convention. 

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Convention

Planning for CCAR Convention 2019 in Cincinnati

Initial planning and brainstorming for a CCAR convention begins 18 months prior to a convention, when the convention committee gathers in the city where the convention is set to take place. When members of the 2019 CCAR Convention Committee gathered in the Queen City and the home of Graeter’s Ice Cream in the fall of 2017, we gathered with excitement because of the prospect of celebrating two significant milestones – Isaac Mayer Wise’s 200th birthday and the 130th anniversary of the CCAR.

A Convention site visit is filled with opportunities to meet with local colleagues and local community leaders as we work to brainstorm the high level learning experiences that we all expect from our annual rabbinic gathering. What would make 2019 in Cincinnati unique? Learning at HUC, prayer at Plum St. and a celebration of our founder, Isaac Mayer Wise, would be memorable moments, but what would the enduring impact be of our learning together? To help us frame our thinking and planning, we reached our to our colleagues, Gary Zola and Jonathan Cohen (former Dean of the HUC’s Cincinnati campus) to teach us about Isaac Mayer Wise and his legacies. Not only did we discover that few of us knew much about his life, aside from founding the major institutions of our movement and his work on Minhag America, but thanks to the wisdom of our wonderful teaches we uncovered Wise’s legacies that we would use as a starting point for our learning goals that helps guide our planning for convention.

Rabbis Zola and Cohen taught us that among Wise’s many contributions to Jewish life in America, four significant legacies include: liturgical innovation, educational expansion, equality of women, and the Americanization of Judaism.

Using these lessons as a guide we created the following five goals:

  1. Build upon the legacy of Isaac Mayer Wise: Where were we? Where are we? Where are we going?: We will explore the following aspects – integration of Judaism into America, the training and education of rabbis, modern understandings of Jewish text and literature and how they apply to contemporary issues, liturgical innovation, Jewish education of adults and children, equality of women and social justice issues.
  2. We will reflect on Mission Driven Transformation:

Isaac Mayer Wise wanted to create an American Rabbinate to lead and serve the emerging Jewish community and to teach Jews who knew how to be Jewish to also be Americans. Today we are in the midst of unique opportunities to engage with Jews who know how to be American but need rabbinic leadership to help them create and live a meaningful Jewish life.

  1. To discover how Cincinnati is a microcosm for some of the challenges we are facing in the rest of the country and its approaches to meet those challenges.
  2. To think deeply about the role Reform Judaism plays in Jewish life in North America and the world.
  3. To mark sacred transitions within the CCAR.

Using these goals as our guide, we will have opportunities to engage in meaningful conversations about innovation. We will engage in study with our esteemed HUC faculty who will respond to key questions and challenges we face in our rabbinate. We will learn to lift up our moral voice and enhance moral leadership as we frame our social justice efforts in Jewish teachings and values. Finally, we will have a special opportunity to have an update from the Task Force on the Women’s Experience in the Rabbinate.

We hope that you will plan to join with colleagues as we reconnect with friends, broaden our rabbinic skills, enhance our rabbinates and celebrate the leadership of Steve Fox and Hara Person. We look forward to seeing you in Cincinnati and enjoying a cup of Graeter’s Black Raspberry chip together. Please register for CCAR Convention at https://www.ccarnet.org/member-services/convention/

—

Rabbi Rick Kellner serves Congregation Beth Tikvah in Columbus, Ohio.  He is also the Chair of the 2019 CCAR Convention Committee. 

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Convention

Words into Deeds: The New CCAR Task Force on Women’s Experiences in the Rabbinate

Rabbi Sally Priesand once said that, “The Central Conference of American Rabbis has been on record since 1922 as being in favor of the ordination of women, but it took fifty years to change the attitudes of people.”[1] Reform Judaism, a denomination that now accepts female rabbis, did not always hold this perspective. Many fears surrounded the concept of female rabbis—a concept that not only challenged a patriarchal, Jewish tradition but also gender-role stereotypes. As a result of these fears, female rabbis had difficulty obtaining pulpit placements. Therefore, in 1976 the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR) organized the Task Force on Women in the Rabbinate, which strived to promote the full acceptance of female rabbis.

Similarly, in December of 2017, in order to respond to the challenges faced by this century’s female rabbis, the CCAR organized the Task Force on Women’s Experiences in the Rabbinate. While much progress has been made since the last task force, there are still many obstacles to overcome in order to achieve gender equality in the rabbinate. Led by Rabbi Ellen Weinberg Dreyfus and Vice-Chair Rabbi Amy Schwartzman, the task force has implemented a three-year plan, with this first year dedicated towards inquiry.

On Monday, March 19th at the 2018 CCAR Convention, a special listening session was held to begin the anonymous information gathering and to learn what areas must be addressed. Through the use of virtual, rapid polling, attendees were asked to respond to questions by typing them into a survey site. The questions revolved around female rabbinic experiences with gender bias in the hiring and advancement process, sexual harassment and assault, statements on appearance made by laypeople, speech by male colleagues and gender dynamics in Jewish institutions. A main ballroom was filled by female and male colleagues of all ages for this interactive session that also allowed time for table discussions. Participants shared about their interactions and experiences, which were transcribed by table leaders. Taking part in this process was a unique opportunity and was surely history in the making!

Although I am newly ordained, I too, directly and indirectly, already know of the challenges female rabbis face. The experience of gender-based comments and undermining behavior, as well as the struggle to negotiate a respectable amount of paid maternity leave all form an insensitive reality that can and should be changed. Although this reality is shaped by a combination of a patriarchal, Jewish tradition and secular, societal trends, if anyone can be the trailblazer of institutional gender equality, it is the CCAR—it is the same organization that was the first to ordain women, and it is the same denomination that was the first to promise religious equality for women in synagogue life.

I am proud of the CCAR for starting this difficult but imperative endeavor that will challenge and be challenged by society’s gender norms. I am proud of HUC-JIR for beginning the conversation on gender inequality these past two years by leading workshops on micro-aggressions, power dynamics and sexual harassment. It is vital for students, staff and professors to be aware of these gendered experiences and to understand how they can play a role in changing the culture of our institutions. Last but not least, I am proud of our male colleagues who are not afraid to be allies and advocates in cultivating and upholding gender equality. As Rabbi Weinberg Dreyfus stated, “The outcome we seek is not just a program or a policy but cultural change within the rabbinate and the movement at large.” Through consciousness-raising, policy-making and accountability, we can achieve this cultural change.

Rabbi Sally Priesand, who was in attendance at this session and who received an applause of appreciation, once wrote that the “the best way to assure that our Movement’s recognition of women is more than symbolic is to bring women into leadership roles on the national as well as the congregational level, to turn our resolutions of the past decade into reality, to translate our words into deeds.”[2] She knew that real change did not come by just identifying concerns and setting goals but by implementing a plan and following through with it. May we once again hold our words and intentions accountable so that they are transformed into deeds.

—

Rabbi Allison B. Cohen serves Congregation B’nai Israel in Boca Raton, FL.

 

 

[1] Interview. Interview With First Female Rabbi. ABC News. 25 Nov. 1973. Television.

[2] Priesand, Rabbi Sally. Letter to Rabbi Alexander Schindler. 1979. Print.

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Convention Israel

Listen to This: Israel is Still A Fragile Dialogue

My wife, Sarah, grew up going to Jewish day school. When I talk about the work I do, she has a very familiar reference point. She has lived it, more or less. I don’t have to explain Jewish ritual to her; more often, she causes me to question and dive deeper into the work that I do. It is a rare opportunity, though, when I get to bring her work into what I do.
A few years ago, she and her colleagues at the Brain and Creativity Institute at USC, published a paper about what happens in the brain when people with strongly held political believes are presented with challenges to those believes. The paper was eventually turned into an episode of the web comic, “The Oatmeal,” titled, “You’re Not Going To Believe What I’m About To Tell You.” The basic premise, as it relates to this topic, is that when people are presented with a challenge to a belief that is connected to one’s core identity, people tend to dismiss this alternative perspective and dig their heels in deeper to their previously strongly held belief.
One of the reasons why CCAR Press’ recent publication, The Fragile Dialogue: New Voices of Liberal Zionism is so poignant is because the Zionist stakes are high. The new voices of liberal Zionism are teaching us that digging into previously held beliefs and narratives sets up a recipe for disaster, or more realistically, disengagement with Israel. At the workshop featuring chapter authors from The Fragile Dialogue, Michael Marmur, Liya Rechtman, and Eric Rosenstein presented diverging narratives of even what it means to be a liberal Zionist today.
Marmur opened with an implicit nod to how we deal with differing narratives, noting, “We create our own myths, which become our facts.” He continued his observation that we try to squeeze each other’s facts into our myths. “Most of us spend a lot of time doing myth preserving, making sure that our myths are neither strengthened nor weakened. This quells creativity around our myths.” This caused me to wonder: the rabbis who created Midrash had no problem getting creative around our foundational myths (Marmur even noted that our tradition has established for us a foundation where “we’re meant to be creatively uncomfortable”) – specifically when it comes to Zionism, why have we shifted so drastically against creativity?
Because it’s a fragile dialogue.
Liya Rechtman presented a narrative which was important for this room to hear, specifically because it was so challenging. “When you have red lines of who you will hear from, you inherently cut people out of the conversation,” she offered. And she’s right. How many times have we not invited — or worse, disinvited — speakers purely because their views crossed a red line for someone in our community? One of my rabbinic mentors has noted, “We spent 2000 years dreaming of having a Jewish parliament, and one of the members of that Jewish parliament wants to speak to us, and we’re saying ‘no’?”
Because it’s a fragile dialogue.
I feared going into this session that if we were to hear, as we did from Liya and Eric, that 21st century Israel narratives are based on the accepting the diversity in our narratives and finding places of mutuality and common ground, whereas 20th century Israel narratives were about the preservation of Jewish life, participants would backfire — digging their heels in, not believing what they were hearing. What gave me hope is that the opposite happened. Yes, assumptions were challenged. Yes, there were disagreements in perspectives. And yes, looking into a mirror of the generational divide on even what it means to be a liberal Zionist was difficult. But we heard each other.
Because we all know it’s a fragile dialogue.
If learning happens through failure, growing at a moment when a premise is challenged, this workshop showed that the future of our leadership and our approach to liberal Zionism is no exception.
Mah tovu ohalecha Ya’akov, mishk’notecha Yisrael – How wonderful are your sessions O Jacob, your dwellings of fragile dialogue, O Israel!
—
Rabbi Jeremy Gimbel serves Congregation Beth Israel in San Diego, CA.
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Convention

Reflecting at CCAR Convention

Dear colleagues,

Having spent the weekend with our 10th graders at the L’taken Social Justice Seminar in Washington, I was overcome with emotion joining the Reform Rabbinate.  As we are “Confronting the Future,” our children – our greatest treasures, are reshaping it.  While we have a sacred duty to guide them, we also need to remember that we can learn from them.

I took lots of photos today, and I put them together to try to capture just a little of the breadth of our experience.  (One photo is of our kids in DC – got to get the dramatic juxtaposition in there!)

I also have quite a few selfies.  But the purpose is not self-serving.  I think it’s important that we all take stock of  just how many people have made a difference in our lives.

We have made each other better rabbis.  We have made each other better people.  We have all helped to create souls.

So take some to time reflect.  Who are the people in your rabbinate who have made that difference?  And how did you make that difference for others?

With love and shalom,

Zach

—
Rabbi Zach Shapiro serves Temple Akiba in Culver City, CA.

 

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Convention

#BlogExodus 4 Nisan: The Ones Who Have Helped Me To Grow

Yesterday morning, Rabbi Aaron Panken, President of Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR), the school at which most of us here at the CCAR Convention—indeed, the vast majority of Reform clergy—went to seminary (and at which I am also currently in Cohort 6 of the Executive Masters program to get a Master of Arts in Religious Education) addressed the Conference at our annual alumni breakfast. We had the chance to study some text, and then we got to what is, to me, the best part.

There are few things that will get hundreds of rabbis, many of whom stayed up much later than usual catching up with friends, awake and eager at 7:!5 am. This is one of them. During the breakfast, as we do every year, we engaged in Roll Call, which Rabbi Panken described this morning as, “That interesting ritual that should be fun.” The origins of this ritual are a mystery, but are steeped in tradition: each year, a representative of the Alumni Association calls out each year of classes ordained from HUC-JIR, and everyone present from that class stands. From the current students who are present to those who were ordained through the decades (at least those who got up for breakfast). Each class stands, to applause from the group as a whole—from current students all the way to someone ordained 60 years ago. Many classes show spirit by waving to each other or cheering. Some classes are gathered together at a table or two—others are spread out, and you can see that some of them have only just seen each other. It’s amazing to see the generations of rabbis, gathered together through a collective memory, while celebrating the unique relationship of each class. We honor our own experience, as well as the chain of tradition that links every person in that room.

The night before, our class had also gathered for dinner (as many classes did)—those ordained in our year, as well as those with whom we shared our year in Israel. I hadn’t seen some of these people since our Israel year, 21 years ago. Others I see regularly. But all of us being together—that’s something truly special. All of us together at breakfast, a significant way to celebrate our connection.

Each year, this breakfast is a reminder: I absolutely come to convention for the inspiration and the learning. To learn from some of the great minds of our time. To gain wisdom from incredible speakers. To delve into text study and ideas in a way that I don’t often get to. To grapple with the challenges of contemporary life. To commiserate over challenges, and argue in debates for the sake of Heaven. To pray in a truly unique and holy community. But, really, if I’m honest, more than all that, it’s about sitting side by side with my colleagues.

It’s an amazing thing, this connection, and one of the quirkier aspects of what is, in myriad ways, a quirky career. As we train for this, we spend 1 year in a foreign country, engaged in an immersive learning environment, followed by 4 years with 1/3 of those people—in a really small and really intense graduate school program. And then we all get scattered around the country (and even further). Thanks to technology, we have a sense of what is going on in each others’ lives—and maybe we see some of these people at other times during the year at other events—but this is the time when we all come together.

The chance to see these classmates, these friends, once a year is precious. Some come nearly every year—others only occasionally. In each case, the convention offers a chance to have an annual reunion of sorts. To catch up with people who have been with us from the very beginning of our careers. To see how we have each grown (and how we haven’t changed). To laugh at old memories. To cry at shared sadnesses. To offer each other a sense of camaraderie and collegiality which is often hard to find.

And, yes, to make connections with those from other generations. To meet senior colleagues whose work we have admired…to see people we went to camp with…to see the rabbis from our own formative years—when we became inspired by Judaism in a way that made us want to become rabbis…to see students who have themselves followed this path.

It’s an amazing thing this annual convention and the conference that forms it. It’s a chance for us to connect to our own experience, to reflect on where we have been and where we are and where we are going, and to remind ourselves of all the folks with whom we get to share this journey.

—

Rabbi Elisa Koppel serves Congregation Beth Emeth in Wilmington, DE. 

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Convention

46 Years of Women Rabbis: A Messy Miracle

The father in the delivery room has a complicated perspective. I know. I have been there twice.

Most of us know little about how our own bodies work – less still, about the physiology of the opposite sex. At childbirth classes, fathers are prepared to help with breathing; and we know that pain is involved. Most men, though, are entirely unprepared to witness all that blood and, for lack of a better term, the messiness of the whole process.

And then, we don’t talk about it, at least not if we’re wise.

Instead, we focus on the miracle. Yes, childbirth is a miracle – not supernatural, but natural; God-given all the same. Two moments in my life have no compare: Seeing each of my sons for the very first time as he emerged from his mother’s body and into the world.

We celebrate the miracle of childbirth but sublimate the messiness. And well we should – at least if we’re talking about childbirth from the father’s viewpoint.

But what if we’re talking about male rabbis’ perspective on the experience of women in the rabbinate? Strikingly similar, at least until recently.

Oh yes, we witnessed the miracles – in some ways, we caused, aided, and enabled it.

Yes, we knew that placement opportunities were not equal, at least in the first several decades.

Yes, we knew about pay disparities, or we should have known.

Many of us, though, did not see the othering, the sexual harassment and even assault. We did not see, perhaps not wanting to see, like the “Pharaoh who knew not Joseph.”[i]

But we did brag about the miracle. Like so many 1950s dads, handing out cigars in hospital waiting rooms. We celebrated that “we” were first.

We rose for standing ovations. For Sally, who was first. For Janet, who was first. For Denise, who was first. And for so many others of “our” firsts.

But we did not speak of the messiness. Upon reflection, we rose to applause – not so much for Sally, for Janet, or for Denise – but for ourselves. After all, “we” were the first to welcome women into “our” rabbinic ranks.

Parashat Tzav is full of messy details about our ancestors’ sacrifices. “The blood, the fat, and the protuberance of the liver” are hard to escape.

Among those sacrifices, introduced last week in Vayikra but given purpose only in Tzav is the shlamim, or “wholeness offering.” Unlike most korbanot (sacrifices), the shlamim is unconnected to sin. Still, it’s messy.

Tamara Cohn Eskenazi teaches in The Torah: A Women’s Commentary that the shlamim was brought on festivals and to express gratitude. Its bounty is shared.[ii] Even with this celebratory korban, though, Torah is frank about “the blood, the fat, and the protuberance of the liver.” We only read about the communal celebration after slogging through the description of gory ritual.

Our teacher Naamah Kelman reminds us of Vayikra Rabah’s suggestion that the shlamim is the only sacrifice that will be offered in messianic days.[iii] Sin will end. Cause for celebration will not.

We do not live in messianic days. Sin endures. And sometimes, b’ratzon u’vishgagah, willingly or unwittingly, we are its perpetrators.

The Central Conference of American Rabbis gathers this week with many goals, not least of which is to examine the entrails to view blood and the dung that have accompanied the miracle we have seen emerge over forty-six years of women in the rabbinate.

When asked about where men’s voices belong in the “#metoo” moment, our teacher Elana Stein Hain has affirmed that every voice should be heard, while suggesting that maybe we need to “take turns.” Now is women’s turn, at least to go first.[iv]

For starters, without ignoring the important role men in Reform leadership played, we must acknowledge that women are the ones who experience the labor pains. Women have given birth to the miracle that is forty-six years of women rabbis in our Conference.

This week, let us speak frankly of the blood, the fat, and the protuberance of the liver; and let us listen attentively.

Then, may this week’s frank acknowledgements inch us closer to that day when the only korban required of us will be the shlamim, to express our boundless, and finally unfettered, gratitude.

—

Rabbi Barry H. Block serves Congregation B’nai Israel in Little Rock, Arkansas, and is a member of the CCAR Board of Trustees.

 

[i] Babylonian Talmud, Sotah 11a.
[ii] Tamara Cohn Eskenazi and Andrea Weiss, editors, The Torah: A Women’s Commentary, New York: URJ Press and Women of Reform Judaism, 2008, p. 609. Cited by Naamah Kelman, “An Offering of Thanksgiving,” ReformJudaism.org.
[iii] Naamah Kelman, “An Offering of Thanksgiving,” ReformJudaism.org.
[iv] “Judaism, #metoo, and Ethical Leadership, Perspectives from the Created Equal Project,” webinar, Shalom Hartman Institute, January 24, 2018.