May 14, 2021 There has been so much cause for grief and sadness lately. It feels a bit like the world is convulsing, like we’re living through Tolkein, a shadow growing longer and darker. Maybe it’s the ongoing trauma of COVID-19; maybe it’s the bulging of hatred and division around … READ MORE

May 7, 2021 In this edition: -Devonte Lewis -Erev Shavu’ot IN-PERSON Gathering!!! -Upcoming programs and classes -Acosta-Molina Family Update   Devonte Lewis As we all continue to process the events of last week, more details about the killing of Urban Dove student Devonte Lewis have emerged. The one detail that … READ MORE

Dear friends,   You have likely heard the troubling news of yesterday’s fatal shooting outside the Urban Dove Charter School. Details of this tragic incident are still emerging. My heart breaks for Devonte Lewis’ family. Another young life lost to gun violence. This has become an all-too-familiar phenomenon in the … READ MORE

April 23, 2021 In this message: Earth Day wrap-up Acosta Molina family – how we can help!    -donations of money (EMJC fund established)    -teachers/tutors for the girls General wrap-up Special Shabbat video! Yesterday was the 51st annual Earth Day celebration. Earth Day was established in 1970 and since that time … READ MORE

Last night, we concluded our four-class series on Jewish memory, We Are What We Remember. (The curriculum was written by the Florence Melton School of Adult Jewish Learning, a project of The Hebrew University of Jerusalem). Over the course of a month, we explored different facets of (as the literature from Melton … READ MORE

I have a few loose items that I’d like to cover this week – a little mid-Passover house-keeping, if you will. So here’s the 1-2-3-4-5-6:   Pandemic Update In a moving and emotional appeal to the country earlier this week, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control … READ MORE

More than any other holiday, Passover is a holiday of miracles. We recall our slavery in Egypt, how God brought ten plagues upon the Egyptians and then took us out of that place. We read the story of the splitting of the Sea of Reeds, the safe passage of the … READ MORE

As we get closer to the Festival of Freedom, the Festival of Border Crossing, I wanted to give you an update on the Acosta-Molina family. If you recall, I wrote about them a few weeks ago. They are a young Honduran family who have applied for asylum in the United … READ MORE

I am a religious Jew. So are you, by the way. You are part of a religious community. You have a religious sensibility which brings you to EMJC and/or other synagogues. A soul that is informed by the religious dimension of our peoplehood resides in you. You are religious.  You … READ MORE

Moe Levine, my paternal grandfather – my Saba – came to this country in 1931, when he was well into his 20s. He immigrated from Vilna, which was then part of Poland, in search of opportunity. He was not a refugee, exactly. The tidal-wave of anti-Semitism that would soon engulf … READ MORE