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11/03/2020 08:54:52 PM

Mar11

Words of the Spirit, by Rabbi Liz Bolton, Or Haneshamah's rabbi and spiritual leader

Elul-Tishrey Message III

08/09/2015 03:25:01 PM

Sep8

During the Jewish months of Elul and Tishrey, I invite you to take each of four themes, and consider them in your thoughts, conversations or rituals. They represent the three simplest essentials of prayers, with a fourth seasonally-specific one: PLEASE. THANKS. YAY! FORGIVE ME.

Yay! This is one of three primary purposes of Jewish prayer. We say a litany of yay words in our Aramaic “doxology,” otherwise known as the Kaddish, in...Read more...

Elul-Tishrey Message II                                       

27/08/2015 01:04:22 PM

Aug27

During the Jewish months of Elul and Tishrey, I invite you to take each of four themes, and consider them in your thoughts, conversations or rituals. They represent the three simplest essentials of prayers, with a fourth seasonally-specific one: PLEASE. THANKS. YAY! FORGIVE ME. 

Thanks: the very first word in the litany of daily Jewish prayer; one of the two “magic” words we remind children to use; a word that can sometimes...Read more...

Elul-Tishrey Message I

17/08/2015 11:09:15 PM

Aug17

During the Jewish months of Elul and Tishrey, I invite you to take each of four themes and consider them in your thoughts, conversations or prayers. They represent the three simplest essentials of prayers, with a fourth seasonally specific one: PLEASE. THANKS. YAY! FORGIVE ME.

Encountering these hot days of summer on the new moon of Elul, exactly one moon cycle before the Ten Days of Awe, can feel, well, too sunny. After all, this...Read more...

Tisha B’Av: Mourning, Memory and Meaning

22/07/2015 09:59:34 PM

Jul22

This mid-summer holiday-that-is-not-a-holy-day, mourning a historical event to which we have difficulty relating, is among the least-observed date on the calendar in liberal Jewish communities. Perhaps the early rabbis felt its difficulties as well, and so added to this fast day commemorating the destruction of the First (586 BCE) and Second Temples (70 CE) in Jerusalem a cumulative list of disasters that have befallen the Jewish people, such...Read more...

To Heal The Earth

18/06/2015 09:57:53 PM

Jun18

As of June 17, 2015, 360 rabbis have signed the Rabbinic Letter on the Climate Crisis. Among those who initiated this letter are Rabbi Arthur Green, past president of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, Rabbi Mordechai Liebling, past head of the Federation of Reconstructionist Congregations and Havurot, and Rabbi Deborah Waxman, president of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College and of Jewish Reconstructionist Communities, our...Read more...

Zil Gmor!*

04/06/2015 09:57:15 PM

Jun4

It’s graduation season. We read reports of interesting (or boring) speeches by famous (or boring) personages. Closer to home, we celebrate with our kin significant milestones: a child’s graduation to the next school level; a young adult’s completion of a degree.

What about the rest of the time? How do we mark the adult phases of the seasons of learning? We encourage life-long learning, but aren’t familiar with the experience...Read more...

The Lost Holiday

13/05/2015 09:56:23 PM

May13

Think of a Jewish holiday. What comes to mind? Food, decorations, preparations, new clothes, food, special songs, family gatherings, synagogue gatherings, symbols, stories, more food.

Hanukkah? Check. (See: latkes, menorahs, dreydls, donuts, Maccabees). Purim? Passover? Each of us can generate a list of at least a few elements pertaining to most Jewish holidays, regardless of our individual experiences with them.

We are...Read more...

Israel and Iyyar

22/04/2015 09:55:38 PM

Apr22

This past Sunday evening, eight OrH members waded into the choppy waters of Israeli-Palestinian-conflict conversation. To properly extend the metaphor, perhaps I should say instead: we started by dipping in our toes, but quickly dove in, knowing that no one would drown.

We accomplished this using tools first introduced to us by previous student rabbis. Some of you may have participated in those structured conversations, using...Read more...

UP for the Count

08/04/2015 09:55:06 PM

Apr8

 The counting of the Omer is both a grounding experience and a transcendent one. The mitzvah, the commandment, is simply to count — count the days between the second seder until the evening of Shavuot, for 49 days in a row.

Yet it marks a mythical and mystical journey from redemption to revelation, liberation from enslavement to our connections as a people. It is as if, having left the narrow places — the meaning behind the...Read more...

From Purim to Pesah II

25/03/2015 09:54:44 PM

Mar25

As many recent surveys and studies note, Passover is the holiday most celebrated and observed by Jews in North America. And while some of you may justifiably contend that this honour belongs to the Days of Awe in the fall, the difference falls to the central event, namely the seder.

The seder is the premier home-based ritual practised by Jews of all stages, ages, and places on the Jewish spectrum. It’s our peoples’ annual...Read more...

Tue, 8 July 2025