Temple Sisterhood is back meeting the second Tuesday of the month to socialize and plan projects in support of our congregation and community.
Most recently, we dined at the new Lucia’s Taqueria at Brown and Wabash avenues and Grand Traverse Pie Company, just south of the ISU campus.
The first community project we’re working on for 2023 is to provide support for newborns at Union Hospital. We welcome your donations!
United Hebrew Congregation will formally welcome its newest members on Friday, Jan. 20, when Patricia and Justin McCammon emerge from the mikveh and complete their conversions to Judaism.
Justin and Patricia, who have been together for 13 years and will celebrate their 11th wedding anniversary in June, entered formal study with Rabbi Jordana Chernow-Reader of Indianapolis Hebrew Congregation and appeared before a rabbinic court, known as a beit din, on January 5.
We present Patricia’s and Justin’s beit din essays here.
If there is something greater than ourselves, what is it? How do we fit into the ever-changing world that surrounds us?
How can an individual find peace of mind, a center, a foundation from which to build and grow when they have no established place?
These questions went through my mind as I sought the answers over my life’s course. This is a journey that encompasses personal beliefs, as well as causes one to question what they feel they already know.
It is a search that led me to a place of comfort and peace within the synagogue, a place of learning, of prayer and of community.
While I considered this essay, my mind kept going in different directions.
I wanted to be heartfelt without sounding cliche. After typing, erasing, re-typing and re-erasing, it hit me: I’ve already written my essay.
I opened my journal and read through entries made over the past three years. While reading, I went from laughing hysterically to bewilderment.
I had forgotten how little I knew about Judaism or how ignorant I was to antisemitic conceptions and remarks. I also noticed trauma responses left by religious organizations present themselves as ignorance, obscenities and absolutes.