“Care, Not Criminalization March” on May 24th at 5pm

On May 24th, the #CareNotCuts and The People’s Plan Coalition (of which VOCAL-NY and JFREJ are a part) will be hosting the “Care, Not Criminalization” mass mobilization. We will be gathering with a broad coalition of New York City groups (including T’ruah EMI partner Freedom Agenda) to demand a city budget that funds dignity, safety, and opportunity for all...
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STEP – Synagogue Teams for Equity and Partnerships

STEP brings together New York-area synagogues who want to build new relationships or deepen existing ones with non-Jewish communities of color, in order to join hands in the struggle for racial and economic justice. In 2021, nine congregations came together to build skills for building relational coalitions and collaboration across lines of difference, particularly race....
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Cleaning up the mess together

One of my favorite programs at my synagogue is our B’nei Mitzvah family retreat. At the beginning of the summer, we take our incoming seventh grade families to camp for the weekend. It’s remarkable: relationships between kids change, parents get to know each other, and, after the Bar or Bat Mitzvah, we keep most of...
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Envisioning a Just Society

In parshat Ki Tetze we encounter the case of the ben sorer u’moreh, the wayward and rebellious son. We read in Devarim 21:18-21 that if a child does not obey his mother and father they should bring him out to the gates of the city before a council of elders, publicly declare him a glutton...
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Sent Out of the Camp

This week’s parashah deals with a somewhat puzzling disease, called tzara’at, often translated as “leprosy.” As the Torah describes it, it’s an affliction that could appear on human skin, on clothes, or even infect houses. It’s not clear if the affliction is truly physical, as Leviticus seems to indicate, or if it’s a physical manifestation of...
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