April 22, 2011

In Conversation: Rabbi Andrea Berlin

Posted by johnmangels under Interfaith, Judaism, Looking for God, Religion, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , |
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One of the blogs I follow is Midlife Bat Mitzvah (by Ilana DeBare).  And she’s just posted a fascinating interview with one of her rabbis — Andrea Berlin.  In it she talks about how her relationship with God (which is both personal and transcendent) changes every day.  She talks about the authority of the Holy Books of various faiths (“Judaism teaches that I am bound to Torah because my people accepted it.   … Only the people who are part of the covenant need to adhere to it.”)  She talks about prayer (and her personal sense of “waking with God” as she climbed Half Dome).  She talks about cyber=Judaism (which she sees as an emerging and helpful supplement to congregational involvement).  And she talks about her anger with God (“My tradition gives me the right to be very angry at God.”).

If I have whetted your appetite, you can find the whole interview here.

 

May 1, 2010

Gospel Shabbat!

Posted by johnmangels under Judaism, World Events | Tags: , , , , , |
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Yes, I realize that (my energy has been low and) I have not been posting of late.  But this, from Midlife Bat Mitzvah is just too good not to mention:  Gospel Shabbat!  It was a special service of the Shabbat set to gospel music composed by Stephen Saxton.  Here are a couple of excerpts:

Rabbi Steven Chester – our senior rabbi, with whom I’m doing my Bat Mitzvah studies – added a political context during the closing benediction when he spoke about Arizona’s controversial new legislation allowing police to stop anyone they suspect of being an illegal immigrant.

and

But I’m straying afield. Back to the Gospel Shabbat – it was moving, uplifting and inspiring. I’d love for our temple to host  it again, maybe several times a year. And I could easily see this receiving an enthusiastic welcome at both synagogues and churches across the country. One of Saxon’s aims with the service, in fact, was to deepen interfaith understanding and connections between Christian churches and Jewish congregations.

It makes a lot of sense since a lot of gospel music is about the Exodus in Egypt and the journey to the Promised Land.  Anyway, if you want the whole article, you can find it here.