Posts Tagged ‘JTS’

 

What do a CNN Anchor, a Rabbi, and a Museum CEO have in common?

Posted on: May 11th, 2012 by Hayim Herring
Little River Baptist Church Sign. Prayer - Wireless Access to God Without Roaming Fees.

From searunner.sv-timemachine.net

You’re probably waiting for a punchline, but this is not a joke. Rather, it was a panel discussion topic of a continuing education program for rabbis in which I was involved last week. (You can read more about the program in Jewish Theological Seminary Chancellor Arnie Eisen’s most recent blog post.) The issue underlying the program was the challenge of engaging younger generations, weaned on social media, in Jewish learning that is spiritually relevant and authentic. Other professions, like broadcast and print media, have had to migrate to multiple channels to reach out to and cultivate younger audiences. And that’s also true of the museum world.

For religious communities, which are conservative by nature, the challenge of engagement is even greater. No matter what the religion or denomination, religions are in the business of preservation, transmission, adaptation and trying to remain faithful to an inherited tradition.  Yet, America is the land of hyper-innovation. So, Ali Velshi,  CNN anchor and chief business correspondent, and Michael Rosenzweig, President and CEO of the National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia, gave us their respective perspectives on this challenge.

What’s the common thread that unites these three different professions? (more…)

Questions of Ultimate Importance

Posted on: August 17th, 2010 by Hayim Herring
Since this past Sunday, I’ve had the real joy of being together with two different groups of Schusterman Rabbinical Fellows. Each group has four distinguished students from HUC and four from JTS, learning together about leadership, outreach and inclusion. In one session, the students heard from an outstanding facilitator who worked with them on speaking authentically, that is, not being pontificators but genuine communicators.
One part of that session triggered three questions that seemed so appropriate to think about as we ready for Rosh ha-Shanah:
when were you recently at your best?
when do you think that the Jewish people acted at its best?
when do you think a significant part of the world behaved at its best?
I hope that you will find these questions pointing to issues of ultimate importance. And I hope that some of you will want to respond to them on this blog. And for anyone who is speaking before a congregation on the holidays about some related topics, please send me your sermons or summarize the key ideas below.
Thank you,
Rabbi Hayim Herring

Since this past Sunday, I’ve had the real joy of being together with two different groups of Schusterman Rabbinical Fellows. Each group has four distinguished students from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion and four from The Jewish Theological Seminary, learning together about leadership, outreach and inclusion. In one session, the students heard from an outstanding facilitator who worked with them on speaking authentically, that is, not being pontificators but genuine communicators.

One part of that session triggered three questions that seemed so appropriate to think about as we ready for Rosh ha-Shanah:

  1. When were you recently at your best?
  2. When do you think that the Jewish people acted at its best?
  3. When do you think a significant part of the world behaved at its best?

I hope that you will find these questions pointing to issues of ultimate importance, and I hope that some of you will want to respond to them on this blog. And for anyone who is speaking before a congregation on the holidays about some related topics, please send me your sermons or summarize the key ideas below.

Thank you,

Rabbi Hayim Herring

image from Flickr, Horia Varlan