This Shabbat Rabbi Rebecca Gutterman of B’nai Tikvah in Walnut Creek sent the following email to her congregation. You probably all know about the sequoia that fell in Calaveras Big Trees State Park. Rabbi Gutterman draws a connection to this week’s Torah portion, Vayechi. Reading it gave me the shivers. For those of us who…
Read More »Here we go – 2017! Our world has been shaken. I, for one, was stunned by the election results. The majority of my family and friends are in categories that feel increasingly unsafe. As a woman I have been subject to sexual harassment and as a Jew I have been told I wasn’t welcome (yes,…
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The email from this Jewish Dad is a pretty common view for men from Reform congregations. For that matter, it’s a pretty common view period. But what do you do when your opinion differs from that of others? I replied to him in my Mixed and Matched column in the J-weekly. My wife is…
Read More »Rabbi Milder of Beth Emek in Pleasanton sent this email to his congregation. He summarizes the four Jewish new years and considers the meaning of the Gregorian New Year that is observed on Dec. 31. Which New Year Is It? The Mishnah records that there are not one, but actually four new years. The rabbis…
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I have a friend who is a food writer and chef. She blogs about food and she writes a food column for the J-weekly (the San Francisco bay area Jewish newspaper). She called me a couple months ago as she was writing her December column to ask, “Is having Christmas and Hanukkah overlap fantastic for…
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Rabbi Milder of Beth Emek in Pleasanton shared the following thoughts with his congregation on the overlap of Christmas and Hanukkah this year. He doesn’t just explain how it is that the two holidays can overlap one year but not the next, he explains the different calendars. It’s some pretty useful information. As Americans we…
Read More »Our weekly email goes out to hundreds of interfaith couples & families in the Bay Area. Topics cover the many questions and mysteries that interfaith couples want answered.