Beloved community,
I want to give you a window into what Friday night services have been like. I’ve found them to be really special, both on Zoom and in person, and I hope that you will join a service soon if you’ve been curious.
In the words of Dori Midnight who’s Hinenu prayer we often read to open our services I want to say welcome to you:
“If you don’t know how to read hebrew. If you have complicated feelings about hebrew. If you love torah. If you want to love torah, but struggle with it. If you don’t really get why people are so into torah. If you don’t know when you’re supposed to stand or sit or bow, or which direction you’re supposed to face and why. If you were raised in a traditional Jewish home (whatever that means) and in a process of opening to other ways to pray.”
There is a joke that every rabbi has one drash (sermon) that they give. If you’ve had a conversation with me about ritual and the Jewish left you’ve probably heard me spiel (ramble on) about how Jewish spiritual communities on the political left need to create space for the variety of Jewish practices that Jews on the political left come from, which ranges from Orthodox to Humanist and secular. Jews on the political left don’t just hail from one religious and spiritual background, rather we come from a multitude, and yet we often only have one spiritual community or synagogue space in any given geographic area that is safe and welcoming to us with our politics. Jewish synagogues on the left are tasked with a tall order to create services that are welcoming to the breadth of tradition and practice represented in our communities. We are trying to figure out how to do this in our Friday night services. We have been exploring how to create services that have room for the mumble and jumble of Hebrew in nusah (trope) that some may be familiar with as well as the inclusion of English poems and songs. In parts of our service we are davening (praying) every single prayer and in other parts we are davening abbreviated prayers and skipping prayers. You can think of our Friday night services as a playground. There is so much room for these services, which only began a couple of months ago in September, to grow and evolve. I hope you’ll come try out a Friday night service with me and offer your feedback so that we can keep adapting and shaping our services to meet the unique community that is Kadima.
You can get a sneak peek into some of the new melodies that we’ve been learning in the Kabbalat Shabbat section of this newsletter. These songs include a new melody for the Mi Shebeirach by Sarah Epstein, a song for mourners we sing after the Mourners Kaddish by Rabbi Koach Baruch Frazier, and a lively new composition of Veshamru by Eitan Kantor.
We gather in person this evening for Shabbat services in the University District at 6pm. Email [email protected] for the location if you need it. I hope to welcome Shabbat with you soon.
Warmly,
Rabbi May
I want to give you a window into what Friday night services have been like. I’ve found them to be really special, both on Zoom and in person, and I hope that you will join a service soon if you’ve been curious.
In the words of Dori Midnight who’s Hinenu prayer we often read to open our services I want to say welcome to you:
“If you don’t know how to read hebrew. If you have complicated feelings about hebrew. If you love torah. If you want to love torah, but struggle with it. If you don’t really get why people are so into torah. If you don’t know when you’re supposed to stand or sit or bow, or which direction you’re supposed to face and why. If you were raised in a traditional Jewish home (whatever that means) and in a process of opening to other ways to pray.”
There is a joke that every rabbi has one drash (sermon) that they give. If you’ve had a conversation with me about ritual and the Jewish left you’ve probably heard me spiel (ramble on) about how Jewish spiritual communities on the political left need to create space for the variety of Jewish practices that Jews on the political left come from, which ranges from Orthodox to Humanist and secular. Jews on the political left don’t just hail from one religious and spiritual background, rather we come from a multitude, and yet we often only have one spiritual community or synagogue space in any given geographic area that is safe and welcoming to us with our politics. Jewish synagogues on the left are tasked with a tall order to create services that are welcoming to the breadth of tradition and practice represented in our communities. We are trying to figure out how to do this in our Friday night services. We have been exploring how to create services that have room for the mumble and jumble of Hebrew in nusah (trope) that some may be familiar with as well as the inclusion of English poems and songs. In parts of our service we are davening (praying) every single prayer and in other parts we are davening abbreviated prayers and skipping prayers. You can think of our Friday night services as a playground. There is so much room for these services, which only began a couple of months ago in September, to grow and evolve. I hope you’ll come try out a Friday night service with me and offer your feedback so that we can keep adapting and shaping our services to meet the unique community that is Kadima.
You can get a sneak peek into some of the new melodies that we’ve been learning in the Kabbalat Shabbat section of this newsletter. These songs include a new melody for the Mi Shebeirach by Sarah Epstein, a song for mourners we sing after the Mourners Kaddish by Rabbi Koach Baruch Frazier, and a lively new composition of Veshamru by Eitan Kantor.
We gather in person this evening for Shabbat services in the University District at 6pm. Email [email protected] for the location if you need it. I hope to welcome Shabbat with you soon.
Warmly,
Rabbi May
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