Religion & Society

Uh, really?

2008-05-23T18:35:00.000-07:00

"Visioning Justice and the American Jewish Community"

2008-05-20T21:08:00.000-07:00

The Nathan Cummings Foundation has published an important report by Shifra Bronznick and Didi Goldenhar on the pursuit of social justice as a key pillar of the American Jewish community. From the introduction by Lance Lindblom and Rabbi Jennie Rosenn:

"Visioning Justice grew out of our belief that we are at a pivotal moment. We have seen tremendous growth in the field of Jewish social justice. The new developments and collaborations that have emerged during this inquiry highlight the ripeness of the field for greater synergy. We now see the opportunity for bringing organizations and individuals together – to create a powerful vision and develop coordinated strategies that will bring the field to the next level of visibility, influence, and impact.
"We also seek through this inquiry and report to engage and influence the Jewish community – that we may make more fully manifest our shared values, building movements for justice in this country and around the world."

I'm proud that two of the projects I led while I was at Synagogue 3000 have earned mention, specifically research and reflection on emergent spiritual communities (pdf) and synagogues & social justice (pdf).

Christian-Jewish Emerging Conversation

2008-05-13T11:30:00.001-07:00

YouTube has Synagogue 3000's video of the ground-breaking January 16-17, 2006, meeting between members of Emergent Village and S3K's Emergent Sacred Communities Working Group.

Emerging to the Top

2008-04-15T10:50:00.000-07:00

There's more to Newsweek's just-published list of America's top 25 pulpit rabbis than meets the eye.

It goes without saying that each person on the list has accomplished extraordinary things, and inclusion in the list is but partial recognition of that.

More broadly, though -- and credit goes to one of their number for noticing this -- the fact that nearly 20% of the rabbis on this list (specifically, Rabbis Andy Bachman, Sharon Brous*, Asher Lopatin, and Rachel Nussbaum) are Jewish emergent leaders challenging conventional definitions of synagogue community and creating new forms of connection across the boundaries of spirituality, learning, and social justice means that whether or not people call it "emergent" or "new" or anything else, something is happening in American Judaism and it's beginning to stick.

These creative leaders are doing the work, separately and together, to build 21st-century Judaism, work which rightly continues to attract notice. It's a privilege to count them as friends & colleagues, and to support & celebrate their leadership.

*Rabbi Brous appears on both Newsweek lists. She also appears on the top 50 influential rabbis list, too, as does Rabbi Naomi Levy, who also leads an emergent community.

Introducing Abigail Gabriela Riemer Landres

2008-03-03T17:21:00.000-08:00

Jewish Intermarriage & the Sociological Question: Testing on the Dependent Variable

2007-12-23T12:42:00.000-08:00

JTA's Sue Fishkoff: Intermarriage: Is it a big problem?

Am I talking out of both sides of my mouth?

2007-12-05T13:57:00.000-08:00

I'm quoted today in The Jewish Week saying

“It’s very easy to look at [the study’s findings] as criticism” of such mainstream Jewish organizations as established synagogues and the network of Jewish federations, says J. Shawn Landres, Synagogue 3000’s director of research. “It’s not offered as criticism.”
The growth of the new prayer groups reflected in the study shows that they are “revitalizing Jewish life,” Landres says.

And my op-ed in today's Forward concludes,

All of these strands are the very antithesis of disengagement from the Jewish community. They are part of a profound critique of communal religious life whose impact remains to be seen and is impossible to predict from its starting conditions — the very definition of emergent.

I don't think I'm contradicting myself, but I do think it's pretty funny.

The study to which both articles refer is here.

NYTimes: Challenging Tradition, Young Jews Worship on Their Terms

2007-11-27T22:04:00.000-08:00

Neela Banerjee of The New York Times has written an excellent article entitled "Challenging Tradition, Young Jews Worship on Their Terms." (Full disclosure: I'm in it.)

In related news, we at S3K and our friends at Mechon Hadar are counting down to this Friday, when we'll share our preliminary report on the 2007 National Spiritual Communities Study. If you’d like to receive a copy of the survey when it's released, please go here to sign up for the mailing list.

Purity and Danger

2007-09-28T17:37:00.000-07:00

I'm in a couple of interesting comment-section debates about this poster campaign, on Jewschool and JSpot.org.

Religion, Violence, Memory, and Place

2006-11-01T16:09:00.000-08:00

Indiana University Press is pleased to announce the recent publication of:

RELIGION, VIOLENCE, MEMORY, AND PLACE
Edited by Oren Baruch Stier and J. Shawn Landres

"After reading these compelling essays, I could not help but feel buffeted by a tidal wave of haunted landscapes, irredeemable violence, and the toxic presence of murderous religious impulses and actions. . . . Every essay demonstrates the editors' articulate claim that memory is an essential dimension of religion—although an essential too often ignored in the discipline—and religion an essential dimension of memory." —from the Postscript by Edward T. Linenthal

Sites of violence often provoke conflicts over memorialization. These conflicts provide insight into the construction and use of memory as a means of achieving public recognition of past wrongs. In this groundbreaking collection, scholars of religious studies, sociology, history, and political science, as well as African, Caribbean, Jewish, and Native American studies, examine the religious memorialization of violent acts that are linked to particular sites. Supported by the essays gathered here, the editors argue that memory is essential to religion and, conversely, that religion is inherent in memory. Other books have considered memory and violence, or religion and place—this collection is the first to discuss the intersection of all four.

296 pages, 26 b&w photos, 1 map
0-253-34799-8, cloth $65.00
0-253-21864-0, paper $24.95

For Instructors: If you are interested in adopting this book for course use, please see our exam copy policy.

Clifford Geertz 1926-2006

2006-10-31T22:28:00.000-08:00

The anthropologist who first taught us that

Religion is (1) a system of symbols which acts to (2) establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations in men by (3) formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and (4) clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that (5) the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic.

"Religion as a Cultural System," in Michael Banton, ed., Anthropological Approaches to the Study of Religion (New York: Praeger, 1966), p. 4

He will be missed.

Cui bono?

2006-09-14T09:22:00.000-07:00

Progressive Jewish Alliance Executive Director Daniel Sokatch questions the attacks on Dr. Maher Hathout and Salam Al-Marayati of MPAC:

What kind of message will discrediting MPAC and its leaders--seen as moderates in the Muslim community--send to millions of American Muslims about their place in our society? If MPAC's moderate agenda is thwarted, what do we think will take its place? Those in the Jewish community who desire MPAC's disappearance should be careful what they wish for.

For more context, see here and here for LA Times coverage. Unfortunately, the LA Times does not quote any of the Jewish leaders who criticized the attacks on Dr. Hathout; the stories leave the general impression that the entire organized Jewish community has mobilized against him, which simply is not the case.

I think it's a shame - and indeed counter-productive - for American Jewish organizations to be out in public criticizing the first-ever county human relations award to a Muslim. And it's horrible for LA interreligious work. Dr. Hathout may be a tough adversary in many respects, and he may say things that Jews and Israelis find hard to hear (though to be fair, he's said nothing that hasn't been said by a good number of Israeli and American Jews themselves). However, as Yitzchak Rabin said, one does not make peace with one's friends - we dialogue with our opponents, not our close allies. He is an honorable man who fights fair. Moreover, he has the courage to grow and change, and to shape and guide his community in the process. Why would anyone want to put barriers in the way of such a leader?

Steven I. Weiss on "The Heresy of Helping Non-Jews"

2006-09-13T08:31:00.000-07:00

As Steven I. Weiss so helpfully recounts, "Judaism has a long and heralded tradition of not only not assisting non-Jews in need, but in outrightly spitting in their eye."

A timely reminder that another vocalization of a major upcoming holiday is Yom Haki-Purim....

Body-building and self-reflection: deeper than you might think.

2006-08-27T21:30:00.000-07:00

My friend and colleague Craig Taubman has launched his second annual Jewels of Elul series of pre-Jewish New Year reflections by prominent Jewish and non-Jewish figures -- including today's author, none other than California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Hmm....

Rules for Jewish chain emails

2006-08-11T13:18:00.000-07:00

Is anyone else as fed up as I am with email chain letters sent around by well-meaning but poorly-informed friends and colleagues in the Jewish community?

Today alone I've received my third or fourth copy of Ehud Olmert's stirring "speech" -- one he never gave. As the original link points out, it is what columnist Ben Caspit would like the PM to say, that is, "the text for a speech by the Prime Minister that would explain to the world exactly what we’re fighting for."

Another email going around, one which breathlessly reports on antisemitc attacks in France that took place four years ago, claims to be based on the Lekarev Report(*). The site won't display archived newsletter issues, so I have no idea whether the age of the "news" is the fault of the chainmail forwarders or of the newsletter authors. Snopes.com dates much of the letter's text to no later than May 2002. It was circulating as new back in November 2005, and now it's making the rounds again. Even Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis has fallen for it.

So, here is my easy two-step guide to forwarding interesting Jewish emails. Before you send, make sure you can answer "yes" to all of the following three sets of questions. If you can't answer yes to all of them, please don't forward the email!

(1) Is it timely and accurate? Have I done due diligence to verify the authenticity, timeliness, and accuracy of this email and the claims made in it?
(2) Is it worth imposing on my friend or family member's inbox? Really? Am I sure?
(3) Is it a day of the week that doesn't end in the letter "y"?

(*) The author of the Lekarev Report, by the way, appears to be one Barbara Richmond aka Leah Rafaeli, who seems to be the widow of a Baptist pastor, "a former Catholic nun turned Messianic Jew after discovering that her natural father was supposedly Jewish", and now an Orthodox Jew (hence the new name). Perhaps her research and reporting is excellent ...but I guess I'd take it with a grain of salt.

Bear s*&%s in woods

2006-07-29T23:16:00.000-07:00

TMZ.com links to PDFs of the arresting officer's notes.

NYT carries Gibson's "apology" and ADL chief Abe Foxman's response. "“Liquor loosens the tongue of what’s in the mind and in the heart, and in his mind and in his heart is his conspiracy theory about Jews and hatred of Jews.” No word from Foxman about what's in Gibson's mind.

LA hybrid free parking extended

2006-06-25T23:57:00.000-07:00

Thanks, Eric.

So close, and yet so far....

2006-06-24T18:52:00.000-07:00

QED.

Social Isolation Growing in U.S., Study Says:

"'We know these close ties are what people depend on in bad times,' she said. 'We're not saying people are completely isolated. They may have 600 friends on Facebook.com [a popular networking Web site] and e-mail 25 people a day, but they are not discussing matters that are personally important.'"

"The Emerging Spiritual Paradigm"

2006-06-21T20:03:00.000-07:00

My article on Jewish Emergent has just appeared in Sh'ma: A Journal of Jewish Responsibility.

Synablog: Rick Warren goes to shul

2006-06-01T00:09:00.000-07:00

From Synablog:

You heard it here first: Rick Warren, of Saddleback Church and Purpose-Driven Life fame, will be the featured guest at a special Friday Night Live Shabbat service on Friday evening, June 16, at 7:30pm, at Sinai Temple in Los Angeles. Saddleback's worship leader Rick Muchow will join S3K Leadership Network member Craig Taubman and Rick Warren will be in conversation with Sinai's Rabbi David Wolpe following the service.

Apparently it will be Rick Warren's first-ever speaking engagement in a synagogue.

Last year, both Ricks, accompanied by Saddleback chief of staff David Chrzan, met with the S3K Leadership Network's Working Group on Spiritual Leadership for a 3-hour conversation, followed by dinner and singing. Video clips from that meeting are available via the sidebar on the lower right-side of this page.

Technojewish coincidences

2006-05-30T09:09:00.000-07:00

Gospel Dynamics: A Matter of Jewish Survival?

2006-04-18T22:30:00.000-07:00

Professor Rabbi Michael Cook, identified as "the only American rabbi holding a full professorial chair in the New Testament," in The Forward:

Engaging the New Testament ...can be both therapeutic and empowering for Jews. At the same time, a willingness by Jews to tackle Christian texts may help enlighten Christians about the role the New Testament has played in violating some of their own values. Jews who are able to articulate to Christians the Gospels' evolution from a Jewish perspective may be in a better position to curb the reckless abandon with which New Testament texts are often so cavalierly cited, bandied about and misconstrued in modern society.

In order to accomplish this, Jews need to master not the New Testament itself, but rather what I would call 'Gospel dynamics.' By Gospel dynamics I mean the manners, mechanisms, and strategies by which early Christian traditions were molded -- or even created -- to resolve religious, social and political problems confronting church communities decades after Jesus' ministry.

...The goal is for Jews to eviscerate the discomfort of living in a Christian environment in favor of a sense of genuine empowerment. This is accomplished by bringing to the New Testament the same paradigmatic Jewish approach to problem solving that Jews have brought to problems in other spheres -- namely, by amassing knowledge.

Two years ago, I taught the University of Judaism's first-ever undergraduate course on Christianity. The Reconstructionist Rabbinical College remains the only major denominational seminary to require its ordinands to have completed a comparative religion course. Professor Cook is absolutely right, of course, but until Jewish leaders are educated about other religions -- particularly Christianity -- they will continue to perpetuate the counterproductive inertia of a more or less ignorant status quo.

Rev. William Sloane Coffin, 1924-2006; Rabbi Arthur Hertzberg, 1921-2006

2006-04-18T00:33:00.001-07:00

May their memories be for a blessing. How ironic - and yet somehow appropriate - that they should make their exit in a year and week when Pesach and Easter, the quintessential Jewish and Christian feasts of liberation, occur in biblical order.

The NYT has excellent obituaries of both Coffin and Hertzberg.

Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly nominated for Webby

2006-04-17T11:02:00.000-07:00

Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly has been nominated for a Webby Award (aka "the online Oscars") in the religion and spirituality category. R&ENW also eligible to win a People's Voice Award, which allows people around the world to vote on the sites that are their favorites. Voting is open to the public from April 11 to May 5.

The other nominees are truly excellent, as well, and I would not want to play favorites. However, there's no question that R&ENW deserves recognition not only for its excellent journalism but also for its website policy, matched by very few other media sites, of posting full segment transcripts from each week's show. In an online environment increasingly characterized by fees for access, this generous policy deserves attention and appreciation.

(NB: The Webby Awards are run by Tiffany Shlain, who created The Tribe.)

FaithJammed....

2006-04-15T18:14:00.000-07:00

[L-R: Craig Taubman, FaithJam Producer Jessica Kate Meyer, Rev. Wilma Jakobsen (All Saints Church), Ani Zonneveld (Progressive Muslim Union) and her daughter Jasmine, and me. Photo: Randy Bellous]

Rob Eshman, editor of the Jewish Journal, attended FaithJam'06, part of Craig Taubman's Let My People Sing Passover festival:

...The evening brought together about ~~150~~ [250, actually] Jews, Muslims and Christians for a night of prayer and music at the center, which had never before hosted such a gathering.

And yes, it began with a drum circle.

But if the faithful had one thing in common, underneath their kippahs and collars and hijabs, it was that not one of them wanted this night confused with those circa-1970-”Free to Be You and Me” warm and cuddly attempts at interfaith dialogue. No, this was Faith Jam 2006.

...Why was this night different from all other attempts at interfaith dialogue?

First, the crowd skewed young. Because the agenda was largely musical, the night brought out young Jews and Muslims, the demographic that wanted a fun night out, not a lecture.

Second, the ritual wasn’t dumbed down. People who knew their stuff conducted Havdalah and the Muslim evening prayer, without abridgment or reinterpretation. I asked [Shawn] Landres [yep - that's me] why that was....

“We’re not doing ‘Kumbaya’ where we all get together and hug,” he said. “This is the way a new generation does dialogue.”

What Landres seemed to mean was: There was no dialogue. We didn’t have to sit in a circle and look into the Other’s eyes and tell him how we feel. No one led a pointless discussion about Mideast peace — as if we have any say in it.

“It’s just breaking the ice,” [Jihad] Turk [Religious Affairs Director of the Islamic Center] told me, “and music goes beyond words.”

...Islamic Center members Nadim and Gita Itani — he’s Lebanese, she’s Iranian — pronounced it good.

“It’s unprecedented,” said Nadim, a 30-something architect. “And it’s about time.”

The apparent success of the enterprise gave him hope.

“It’s foundational,” he said. “Singing beside a Jew as we close the Sabbath, that’s when you get goose bumps.”

A young Palestinian American who only wanted to give his name as Muhammed — “I work in the entertainment industry,” he explained — said the Havdalah ritual he witnessed touched him, too.

“We have to all get together,” he said. “People who are opposed to this kind of night, they shouldn’t even be in this country.”

Now that kind of intolerance? It’s a beautiful thing.