Rabbi Natan Margalit
My work at Organic Torah starts with asking a question about chochma/Jewish wisdom: Must the Tree of Knowledge be separated from the Tree of Life? The Tree of Knowledge is what we have become used to in much of our Western education—it begins with breaking things apart into smallest components. Our education system is divided […]
Dr. Julie Lieber
I appreciated the opportunity to read Rabbi Sid Schwarz’s chapter in Jewish Megatrends and to reflect on the ways in which Kevah’s work in many way responds to many of the trends identified. Before discussing directly Kevah’s work as it relates to this chapter, I do want to reflect more broadly on an underlying theme […]
Audrey Lichter
Our program, Chai Mitzvah, currently works across the spectrum of the Jewish community and across the generations. We work with over 30 teen groups, young professionals, baby boomers and seniors. We even have three groups in senior living facilities with people ages 90 to over 100! In general, we have found less enthusiasm among funders […]
Ilana Lerman
I am connected to Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and IfNotNow, which bring Schwarz’s proposals to life, although the trends he outlines are ancient, central elements throughout Jewish history. JVP and IfNotNow serve and embolden a new kind of hybrid/anti- ‘Tribal’ Jew: people who love being Jewish; who celebrate Ashkenazi, Sephardi, Mizrachi, and mixed ethnicities; […]
Renna Khuner-Haber
The morning after the election, several people reached out to me with the same question – can we sing? In the days after a tragic death in my extended community, close friends of the dearly departed called me – can we sing? I recently received an email from someone thanking me for two hours of […]
Daniel Kaplan
In Jewish Megatrends, Rabbi Schwarz provides an important framework for understanding how Jewish communal organizations can avoid decline and infuse vibrancy into Jewish North America. I appreciated reading Rabbi Schwarz’s thesis as both a Jewish professional and as a lay leader in an informal Jewish community. I am community organizer at the Jewish Council on […]
David Zvi Kalman
I am in broad agreement with Rabbi Sid Schwarz’s propositions in Jewish Megatrends: Charting the Course of the American Jewish Future. Indeed, I have seen at least one of these sentiments expressed in the vision statements of almost all creative Jewish endeavors over the years, including my for-profit publishing house (Print-O-Craft LLC) and the not-for-profit […]
David Jordan Harris
In Rabbi Schwarz’s book Jewish Megatrends: Charting the Course of the American Jewish Future, he uses four themes to organize the Jewish future. All of the themes—chochma, tzedek, kehilla, and kedusha—appear regularly, powerfully, and imaginatively in the spectrum of work of hundreds of Jewish artists who are supported by Rimon: The Minnesota Jewish Arts Council. Work […]
Rabbi Jill Hammer
Kohenet Kohenet is a training program in spiritual leadership for women on a Jewish path. The Kohenet Hebrew Priestess Institute trains its kohanot to create a Jewish ritual experience inclusive of women’s history and experience, embodied and earth-based in its approach, and innovative in its language about God/dess, people and the world. Kohenet is a […]
Rishe Groner
It’s never been more clear that people are starving for meaning, spirituality, connection and community, and they’re not receiving it from organized religion. The thesis that Judaism requires out-of-the-box revitalization and new ways of approaching spiritual community is evident by my own work over the last several years in Brooklyn. Jewish involvement is not dying. […]
Rabbi Dan Goldblatt
I serve a Bay Area suburban congregation that is predominantly secular with a smattering of Jewish searchers and seekers. For many years, we had a community dominated by families with young children. At one point we had about 280 member units and approximately 235 children in our Religious School (through B’nei Mitzvah). Because B’nei Mitzvah […]
Rabbi Avi Finegold
I read with great interest the opening chapter of Jewish Megatrends and the manner in which the ideas were presented made me reexamine my own work in the Jewish community. While I can fairly say that my work touches on all of the ideas presented in some way I would like to focus on two […]
Julie Emden
Embodied Jewish Learning (EJL) at Jewish LearningWorks offers an alternative point of connection to Jewish life through workshops and teacher trainings in experiential body-based text study. Our work is aligned primarily with the values of Chochma (Wisdom), Kehillah (Community) and Kedusha (Holiness). In addition, we employ the values of Mishkan (Embodied Spirituality), Yetzirah (Creativity and Transformation) and Shlemut […]
Jessica Deutsch
The motivation behind my work is to find the light and relevant holiness in this world. Primarily, I’m a visual artist, however, this is not to say that my work is limited to paper and pen. While I’m working on a piece in my studio, I’m almost always simultaneously dreaming up a vision for community […]
Cheryl Cook
“My family is looking for help finding temporary housing. My parents were on vacation in Boston (from CA) and my mom was run over by a truck while crossing the street. She is currently in the ICU in stable, but critical condition. We are expecting her recovery to take at least 6 weeks.” This email […]
Rabbi Sara Brandes
The Jewish world has shifted since the publication of Megatrends, and many of the insights offered therein have been integrated into Jewish organizations, especially those in the NPSCI network. The mission of Or HaLev, a lean non-profit, founded in 2006, unencumbered by institutional history, a mortgage, etc. is fully in line with Schwarz’s four propositions, […]
Carrie Bornstein
Since 2004, Mayyim Hayyim Living Waters Community Mikveh and Education Center has welcomed nearly 8,000 people for close to 17,000 immersions. The overwhelming majority of our visitors, who range in age from infancy through seniors and everything in between, would not know anything about a mikveh, much less want to visit one, were it not […]
Rabbi Tiferet Berenbaum
I first read this essay when it came out in 2013, just before graduating rabbinical school. It was an invaluable tool for communicating my vision with my synagogue and the greater Milwaukee community. As I am preparing to leave Congregation Shir Hadash, I want to consider my work in the context of three of the […]
Matt Bar
Excluding strange mystic experiences and perplexing dreams that whispered lech lecha into my soul at night, I had a perfectly outlined ‘covenantal identity’ childhood. My family was not religiously homogeneous nor observant. I was bar-mitzvahed at a Reform synagogue. I was a High Holiday Jew, a covenantal Jew. I would argue I have since become […]
Joshua Avedon
First as one of Ikar’s founders, then at Synagogue 3000, and currently at Jumpstart, I’ve had the privilege to work in the U.S., Europe, and Israel with leaders of new organizations and communities of all types and persuasions. I came to this work as someone who grew up disaffected from Jewish life, but who came […]