342 results for tag: Community Leaders

Earth Etude for Elul 1 Alarm Clock for the Soul

by Rabbi Katy Z. Allen~ Today marks the beginning of the month of Elul, a period of self-reflection and the search for forgiveness. Each day during this month, you will find here an Earth Etude for Elul, a short reflection on teshuvah and Earth by a member or friend of Ma’yan Tikvah. We hope these Etudes will help you along the way on your journey.  It’s Elul. Once again. We’ll hear the shofar in the mornings, trying to wake us up. An alarm clock for our souls. For every morning, the Sun rises. Sometimes I’d like to hit snooze, but Ruach HaKodesh – the Holy Spirit – won’t let me, or, if S/He/It ...

Aytzim (Ecological Judaism) is Back—Let’s reconnect!

It’s a mystery — we lost our Aytzim facebook page and all our facebook friends. So we will be sending out new invites to like our page. In case you have forgotten, we are all about the environment — saving our world. And these days, it has become more important than ever. Aytzim is the umbrella organization of: Green Zionist Alliance, Jewcology.org, EcoJews, and Shomrei Breishit: Rabbis and Cantors for the Earth. Aytzim means “trees” and here’s a little about the other organizations in our product grove: Green Zionist Alliance—Since its founding in 2001, the Green Zionist Alliance has successfully worked for the declaration of new ...

Shavuot and the Connection to Vegetarianism

    A compilation of articles by Richard Schwartz A Dialogue on Shavuot Night For many years Danny Shapiro looked forward to staying up all night at his synagogue with his friends on the first night of Shavuot, hearing talks about and discussing Torah teachings. This year he especially anticipated this annual commemoration of the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai, because Rabbi Greenberg would be meeting with Danny and other college students for an hour at 3 AM to answer any questions on Judaism that they brought up. Danny had recently become a vegetarian and had done a lot of background reading on Jewish connections to ...

Passover: How to improve your health and our world

  Richard Schwartz makes the connection between a vegetarian (vegan) diet and how it fits with the meaning of Passover in these 3 essays. 1. Freeing Ourselves at Passover From Diets That Hurt Us and the Planet Jews commendably go to extraordinary lengths before and during Passover to avoid certain foods, in keeping with Torah mitzvot. But at the same time, many continue eating other foods that, by Torah standards, are hardly ideal. Read more... 2. Applying Passover Messages Can Help Heal Our Imperiled Planet There are many Passover-related messages that can be applied to help shift our imperiled planet onto a sustainable ...

Environmental Issues in Israel

The Third Annual Barbara Siegel Memorial Israel Program will be on Sunday, April 2 at 11:00 am at Congregation Or Hadash in Fort Washington, PA. Our speaker, David Krantz, is a National Science Foundation IGERT Fellow and a Wrigley Fellow researching solar-energy policy and faith-based environmentalism. He also runs the environmental nonprofit, Aytzim: Ecological Judaism, parent organization of Jewcology.org, the Green Zionist Alliance, EcoJews, and Shomrei Breishit: Rabbis and Cantors for the Earth. He serves on the board of directors of Interfaith Moral Action on Climate; on the board of directors of Arizona Interfaith Power & Light; ...

Shmita Revival: The Reconsideration and Expansion of Sacred Land

  David Krantz will be speaking at the Mountain and Sacred Landscape Conference at The New School in New York City on Friday, April 21 from 8:30 to 10:00 am. David is a National Science Foundation IGERT Fellow and a Wrigley Fellow researching solar-energy policy and faith-based environmentalism. He also runs the environmental nonprofit, Aytzim: Ecological Judaism, parent organization of Jewcology.org, the Green Zionist Alliance, EcoJews, and Shomrei Breishit: Rabbis and Cantors for the Earth. He serves on the board of directors of Interfaith Moral Action on Climate; on the board of directors of Arizona Interfaith Power & Light; on ...

Seasons in the Era of Climate Change

by Stephen Jurovics, Ph.D. Each of the seasons of the year can evoke, for many of us, an image of what we most enjoy about that period. It may be the sequence of warm spring days with clear blue skies during which the outside world exerts a strong pull and diminishes our commitment to work or study, that period we call “spring fever.” For others, it’s the summer days of sunshine and high temperatures when many leave work to vacation at the beach and enjoy the water, sand, and sunshine. The familiar images and anticipated enjoyment are inexorably moving towards the remembered and unpredictable. Climate change is transforming ...

Powering the Promised Land: Fracking and Energy Use in Israel

Limmud AZ presents speaker David Krantz at 11:30 am  - 12:30 pm on Sunday, February 12, 2016. What's the source of the electricity that powers the lights when you flick the switch in Israel? Hint: It may not be what you think. Israel is on the verge of becoming an energy superpower, but at what cost? Learn what most Israelis don't know about Israel's energy situation. David Krantz runs Aytzim: Ecological Judaism, parent organization of Jewcology.org, the Green Zionist Alliance, and Shomrei Breishit: Rabbis and Cantors for the Earth. He also serves on the board of directors of Interfaith Moral Action on Climate and Arizona Interfaith Power ...

Tu B’Shvat: Celebrating the New Year for Trees

by Richard Schwartz Richard Schwartz has written this anthology about Tu B'Shvat (also written as Tu Bishvat), the holiday that is on the 15th of Shvat (this year starting on Monday evening, February 10 through Tuesday, February 11). The celebration in some ways can be similar to a Passover seder (not as long), and the foods served (many fruits and nuts) have special significance. In addition there are many reasons that Tu B'Shvat is especially important today with our concerns about the environment and climate change. Take a look at the articles below to learn more about Tu B'Shvat and to plan your celebration. Why Is This Night Different?: ...

Small Changes Add Up to Make a Big Difference!

After the November election, many of us were left with numerous concerns, including about how the president-elect and his advisors will deal with environmental issues such as climate change. While those concerns are still valid, I realized there are many things I could change about how I live my life that can make a difference for the environment. I made three resolutions: reduce, reuse and recycle. Resolution #1: Reduce. I am going to buy less — especially those things that have a negative impact on the environment, such as plastic tableware when I have company coming for dinner. I am also going to reduce my energy needs. I am going to ...

Shanah Tovah 5777

by Rabbi Katy Z. Allen   As you enter this new year may distance bring clarity     and may the many shades of the forest be clear to you  as separate and individual colors each unique in its own right   may the sky be ever visible to you  between the leaves    may you understand that the leaves the sky and the tendrils are all interconnected    and when you cry out for help may your prayer be answered.     Shanah tovah, may you have a good year.     ...

Earth Etude for Elul 29: Hope Sprouting

by Rabbi Judith Kummer   ~ When the world is whirling and despair for the future begins to crowd in I turn to growing things, seeking hope.   The sweet potato plant cutting I made last week, Bereft of leaves but stuck into a vase to root anyway-- Just in case-- has now sprouted tiny purple and spring-green leaves, against all odds.   How did it know to grow, know it could grow?  What generative force propelled it forward into a future I sometimes cannot imagine?   In the garden Swaths of bright blooms Separate out into  a single glorious flower, Beauty against all ...

Earth Etude for Elul 28: Our Repentance, Prayer, and Deeds of Righteous Action Will Stop Climate Change

by Dr. Mirele B. Goldsmith ~ This year, as the sun sets on Yom Kippur, our prayers will reach a pinnacle of intensity as we recite the UnetanehTokef prayer:  “On Rosh Hashanah it is written, and on Yom Kippur it is sealed.  How many shall leave this world, and how many shall be born; who shall live and who shall die, who in the fullness of years and who before; who shall perish by fire and who by water, who by sword and who by a wild beast; who by famine and who by thirst…   But repentance, prayer, and deeds of righteous action, can remove the severity of the decree.” The Unetaneh Tokef was written ages ago, perhaps as early as the ...

May it bee a sweet new year

"May you bee inscribed and sealed in the book of life for a good and sweet new year.  May all your offspring survive to see adulthood and may you successfully pollinate our crops so that we will have sufficient to eat." It's not that I'm actually suggesting this prayer is added to our Rosh HaShanah prayer books - heaven know the services last long enough already - but the words did spring to mind now that we are surrounded by pictures of fluffy cute bumblebees in the run up to the Jewish New Year. These yellow and black critters have become as much symbols of the coming festival as are Shofars and pomegranates, due to the slightly tenuous link ...

Earth Etude for Elul 27: Teshuvah in the Garden

by Maxine Lyons ~ My perennial love relationship with the earth is expressed most explicitly in tending my flower gardens. For me it is spiritual work, a way to respect the earth while feeling more mindful of how growth and change is an ongoing  process and mirrors the major themes of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. The spiritual work of Teshuvah on the Yamim Norayim for me often centers on facing challenges, reviewing the aspects of my life that need changing and seeking new ways that I can re-commit myself to positive actions to bring about those changes. The natural world starts me on this path.  For example, the row of pine trees that form a ...

Earth Etude for Elul 26: You Were Wrong

by Ben Weilerstein ~ I You were wrong about environmentalism, man, no that’s not what I think no, I’m not really an environmentalist because if I say I am you’ll say in your head I’m saying things you don’t think need to be said, out loud, at all so, no, I’m not an environmentalist and I don’t feel a rush of flight, of my heels lifting up off the ground when I recycle a plastic bottle not like I do when I recite over and over again until it doesn’t leave my head for years,  “stop! the! pipeline!” or something like that, y’know my voice woven into hundreds and thousands of others because dammit this isn’t about ...

Earth Etude for Elul 24: What Is Remembering?

by Steph Zabel ~ What is remembering? As I’ve ponder this question over the past several days, the following thoughts have come to me… Remembering is a return to wholeness and truth: a wholeness of self, of spirit, of place in the world. When we remember who we are, why we are here, and how we relate to the world around us, these remembrances — these truths — infuse our lives with richness and radiate outwards to all the lives around us. I think that remembering must also paradoxically involve forgetting… For instance: When we remember that all human beings, of all backgrounds and beliefs, deserve love, dignity and compassion, ...

Earth Etude for Elul 23: Tandem

by Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman               Biking home on Orchard Street With the wind behind me, and Jamaica Pond Wrinkled and clear beyond the houses, A peregrine falcon winged down A feathered grace, gliding on my right.   For a breath, two, we flew side by side.   My grief, of late, has become more precise. There are worlds Beyond worlds, the eons will stretch Over bedrock and magma, blue and green. There is life and Life and God unending No matter what we do, where we are. So I cry for us, for here, for what we know and ...

Earth Etude for Elul 22: Earth Rituals

by Molly Bajgot ~ This is what rituals are for. We do spiritual ceremonies as human beings in order to create a safe resting place for our most complicated feelings of joy or trauma, so that we don't have to haul those feelings around with us forever, weighing us down. We all need such places of ritual safekeeping. And I do believe that if your culture or tradition doesn't have the specific ritual you are craving, then you are absolutely permitted to make up a ceremony of your own devising, fixing your own broken-down emotional systems with all the do-it-yourself resourcefulness of a generous plumber/poet.  ― Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love ...

Earth Etude for Elul 21: The Food We Eat

by Leora Mallach ~ The severe drought affecting the northeast this growing season is causing farmers to apply for federal disaster relief (they must prove at least 30% crop loss to qualify). According to USDA data, Massachusetts topsoils were 25% drier in July 2016 than the 10 year mean, and there are mandatory water restrictions in many towns. The National Drought Mitigation Center (NDMC), established at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1995, tells us: Drought is an insidious hazard of nature. It is often referred to as a "creeping phenomenon" and its impacts vary from region to region. In the most general sense, drought ...