Dr. Nancy Sommers to honor her mother, Louise, as Yom HaShoah keynote speaker at UHC

By Terry Fear

Dr. Nancy Sommers, a native of Terre Haute and former member of United Hebrew Congregation, will be keynote speaker for Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) at 7 p.m. Sunday, May 5, at UHC.

Her subject will be “My Mother’s Story — Creating Light from Darkness and Optimism out of Tragedy”. Dr. Sommers’s mother is longtime UHC member Louise Levite Sommers, a Holocaust survivor and resident of Terre Haute.

The program is sponsored by UHC and CANDLES Holocaust Museum and Education Center.

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Celebrants fill Vestry Room for Passover seder

A record crowd for the Terre Haute diaspora era of more than 50 people filled the Vestry Room for the annual community Passover seder Friday, April 19, at United Hebrew Congregation.

Herschel Chait led Kabbalat Shabbat in the sanctuary and, adorned in seasonal matzoh tie and kippah, shared seder-hosting duties with Temple president Betsy Frank.

Listen to audio and view photos from the event, and check out Chistina’s Best Charoses recipe!

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Rwanda survivor Emmanuel Habimana speaks at UHC, calls for resistance, resilience, respect

As mounting instances of identity-based violence arouse memories of historic, mass atrocities, alarmed communities across the U.S. increasingly counter with public vigils and calls for peaceful resolution to conflict.

Here in Terre Haute, UHC’s sanctuary provides a welcoming venue for such events. On April 7, the 25th anniversary of the day Rwanda’s Hutu majority unleashed a genocide that took the lives of 800,000 people, mostly of the Tutsi minority, UHC welcomed survivor Emmanuel Habimana and the Terre Haute South Vigo High School STAND club to present a special program entitled #TogetherWeRemember.

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Spring is here. Now would be a good time for working women to join Temple Sisterhood!

By Patty Lewis

Sisterhood will meet at noon Tuesday, April 16, at Rick’s Smokehouse, 3102 Wabash Ave. in Terre Haute. Please join us!

Last month, we got together at the Fly-IN Cafe at Terre Haute Regional Airport. I think everyone enjoyed watching the planes as we ate some delicious food.

We held a brief meeting after our meal, allowing us to take care of a few tasks and make some decisions.

As we have for many years, Sisterhood will make a donation to CANDLES Holocaust Museum and Education Center. The museum is an important part of the past and the future. We also decided we will help military veterans this year.

I know some of you ladies still considering Sisterhood but have not yet joined. We would love to have all the women at our Temple to be a part of our organization. You can still make a difference as a member of Sisterhood, even if you can’t make it to meetings!

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