Listen up!

I’m happy to announce (after recovering from Thanksgiving) that rabbi school is done and I’ve been officially installed as the rabbi at Machar, the Washington Congregation for Secular Humanistic Judaism.

As part of the graduation/ordination process, which occurred during Shabbat services on November 10, 2017 at the Birmingham Temple (the founding congregation of Humanistic Judaism), I gave a talk, which you can watch below:

The talks of three madrikhim/ot (a lay leadership/para-rabbinic leadership program) graduates, another rabbinical ordination, and a posthumous honorary ordination, can also be viewed.

The following weekend, I was installed at Machar. I gave a talk there, too, and if the video worked as planned, hopefully I’ll be able to post that, too.

A Humanistic Rosh Hashanah Round-Up

Rosh Hashanah starts at sundown on Wednesday this week. I’m likely to be occupied with other items this week (not the least of which is two days of continuing legal education in a facility that charges about $40/day for “real” WiFi) and thus won’t end up with an original, dedicated Rosh Hashanah post. Instead, I’ll provide links to materials from others in the Humanistic Jewish world (and some of my own), as I know this would be a helpful consolidation of resources for some of my readers who have looked for resources but sometimes find their searches coming up short.

Yom Kippur

City Congregation, the Humanistic Jewish congregation in NYC, has posted this interview with Rabbi Miriam Jerris, who leads the Society for Humanistic Judaism, explaining how Yom Kippur “works” for those of us who are Humanistic Jews. The SHJ has a video from Rabbi Jeffrey Falick, who is Rabbi at The Birmingham Temple, the first SHJ congregation, that also discusses it.

If you fast, I wish you an easy fast. And, in any event, I wish you a meaningful, constructive Yom Kippur.

They are short videos; give them a watch.