Written By: Gillian Jackson and Clare Kinberg
Pride Events at AARC:
PRIDE SHABBAT: Saturday June 12, 10 AM Ta Shma, 10:30 AM Shabbat service. Join us for a Pride-focused ‘Pray What’ to learn how our traditional prayers have been reconstructed (by Reconstructionists and non-Reconstructionists!) to include non-heteronormative models of love and relationship, and a Shabbat morning service honoring and amplifying the many voices of our queer elders, siblings, and children.
Zoom link for services will be sent out the week before the event; if you are not on our mailing list and would like to participate, please email us!
LGBTQ Jewish History Workshop with Keshet: Sunday June 20, 2-3:15 PM. This interactive workshop for AARC members and friends explores key moments in LGBTQ Jewish history in the United States and the implications of this history for our work on LGBTQ equality and belonging in Jewish life today.
Note: This workshop assumes some basic familiarity with LGBTQ identities and will not provide an introduction to gender identity and sexual orientation. Participants can familiarize themselves with these terms and concepts through Keshet’s LGBTQ Terminology sheet, available in our online Resource Library.
Zoom link for services will be sent out the week before the event, if you are not on our mailing list and would like to participate, please email us!
Happy Pride Happy Hour: Saturday June 26, 6-9 PM. AARC members Robin Wagner and Sharon Haar invite our LGBTQ+ members to drinks and light dinner on their patio to celebrate Pride Month. To RSVP, please fill out this sign-up genius.
Here are some other ways to engage with LGBTQ Pride activities this month:
Read this gorgeous essay, Queer Delicacy: An Ancient Approach to Halakhah, by Congregation Agudas Achim’s Rabbi Alex Weissman
Watch this symposium on Jewish Queer History from the Center for LGBTQ and Gender Studies in Religion recorded this year on May 2. Twenty years after the publication of Queer Jews, this symposium in memory of its co-editor David Shneer brings together many of the most thoughtful Jews in the movement: Dr. Bernie Schlager, Christie Balka, Dr. Gregg Drinkwater, Avi Rose, Rabbi Jane Rachel Litman, Ali Cannon, Hadar Ma’ayan Dubowsky, Rabbi Steve Greenberg, Rabbi Robert Judd, TJ Michels, Rabbi Mychal Copeland, Dr. Marla Brettschneider, Sandi Simcha DuBowski, Dr. Ruti Kadish, Eve Sicular , Rabbi David Dunn Bauer, Dr. Jodi Eichler-Levine, Koach Baruch Frazier, Dr. Samira Mehta, Dr. Lori Lefkovitz, Jaron Kanegson, Dr. Jonathan Krasner, Moderator: Idit Klein), Rabbi Aviva Goldberg, Rabbi Evette Lutman, Dr. Kathy Simon. It’s long, enjoy parts of it at a time.
Watch some queer theatre from the National Queer Theatre of NYC. Their Criminal Queerness Festival, June 22-26 presents explosive new plays by LGBTQ artists from countries that criminalize queer and trans people.
“‘Together we can make a safe home:'” Space, Violence and Lesbian Activism” is a presentation on 1970s St. Louis lesbian history. Learn about AARC Beit Sefer director Clare Kinberg’s story. LGBTQ history is personal!
