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Ann Arbor Reconstructionist Congregation

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Member Profiles

Member Spotlight: Janet Kelman and Dave Rein

November 10, 2021 by Gillian Jackson

Janet Kelman, her husband Dave Rein, and their cat Fred!

Janet Kelman joined AARC in 2019.  She and her husband, Dave Rein, live 
in Ann Arbor.  Janet is an artist who has lovingly created art and 
architectural glass for over fifty years (www.janetkelman.com). Janet 
will be showing her work at Art Sale at the Valley over Thanksgiving 
weekend (www.artsaleatthevalley.com). Dave is an episodically retired 
software engineer and terrific in house tech help.

Janet, Emily E., and Leora are the AARC Publicity Committee! They 
diligently work to showcase the amazing events happening in AARC to the 
wider Washtenaw Jewish Community.

Filed Under: Member Profiles Tagged With: community, member spotlight

Welcome New Members Jeremy Singer and Jenn Swanson

October 24, 2021 by Gillian Jackson

Jenn and Jeremy moved to Ann Arbor in August. They live in the Old West Side neighborhood with their puppy Luna. They are engaged, and getting married in August 2022. Jeremy was raised in a Reform congregation, and Jenn is in the process of converting to Judaism. They previously lived in Detroit, where both of them worked as teachers. Jenn now attends law school at the University of Michigan, and is interested in labor law. Jeremy works as a research assistant at Wayne State University and is completing his Ph.D. in educational policy.

Filed Under: Member Profiles Tagged With: community, new member spotlight

Welcome New Members Paula, Bori, and Adiv!

December 16, 2020 by Gillian Jackson

Paula, Bori, and Adiv have been attending services since this summer and are now excited to become official AARC members! Paula and Bori moved from Boston in July and feel lucky to have found such a welcoming community here. 
Bori is a medical student at the University of Michigan and Paula is a medical assistant currently working towards a nursing degree and staying home with Adiv, who was born in September. In their free time, they enjoy hiking and camping, playing music, and taking family walks with their dogs, Henry and Arthur. 

A warm welcome to our newest member household!

Filed Under: Member Profiles Tagged With: members, new members

Welcome Back, Ahuvia Family!

December 3, 2020 by Gillian Jackson

Hello everyone,

We’re Aura and Aaron Ahuvia, and we are happily returning to our home, Ann Arbor, after a few years of being away. We are super-excited to meet you all, and to get re-acquainted! We’ve had some excellent adventures, first in Woodstock, NY, then in the Detroit burbs where Aura was working as a congregational Rabbi. We were so happy that things finally worked for us to return home, even though we never anticipated the move taking place during a pandemic!

When we’re not painting the walls of our new house, or playing with our new dog, Nikki, Aaron is a professor of Marketing and Consumer Psychology at U-M Dearborn, and Aura is a rabbi ordained through the Jewish renewal movement, known as ALEPH: Alliance for Jewish Renewal. Aura plans on teaching online for the time being, while Aaron is enjoying his year of sabbatical to work on his book (working title: The Things We Love). When participating in AARC events, Aura looks forward to being a “Jew in the pew,” i.e., she will not be performing rabbinical roles under the auspices of the AARC.  You can call her “Aura.” 

Kid update: Some of you will remember our sons, Isaac and Jonah. Isaac just entered a PhD program this fall in clinical psych at SUNY Stonybrook, on Long Island. He’s really enjoying his coursework and peers, albeit mostly remotely for now. Jonah put his undergraduate work on pause when the pandemic hit and is working and living with us for the time being. 

We have a long history with AARC (or “The Hav” as we will probably never stop calling it) and are very pleased to see it thriving. We can’t wait to get back into the swing of things. 

Aura & Aaron

Filed Under: Member Profiles

Welcome New Member Hannah Davis!

July 12, 2020 by Gillian Jackson

Hannah writes:

I’ve lived in Ann Arbor since 2014, and before that was in Kalamazoo, where I was raised. I grew up going to Temple B’nai Israel, wandered away from religion for over a decade, and recently rediscovered joy in Judaism after a tour of Ann Arbor congregations led me to AARC!

My day job (pandemic notwithstanding) is as a barista at Sweetwaters, and I’m training to become a copyeditor as well. I’m an avid reader of fantasy and science fiction, I love learning languages (including Spanish, Hebrew, and Tamil), I play the flute, keep house plants, and clearly have too many hobbies. 

AARC has been so welcoming and safe to me from the first service I came to. I leave every event having made a new acquaintance and having had engaging conversations, and I’m so happy to be a member now!

AARC welcomes you, Hannah!

Filed Under: Member Profiles Tagged With: new members, welcome

Welcome New Members Andrew and Susan Flint!

June 22, 2020 by Gillian Jackson

Andrew writes:

Susan and I moved to Ann Arbor many years ago when I became affiliated with the University of Michigan School of Medicine. Susan is a retired reference librarian and a graduate of U-M.

We have two daughters, a granddaughter, and a son-in-law,
all of whom live on the East Coast. I continue to teach at the University and have become the director of the Center for Automotive Gerontology.

Teaching, books, Airedales, cooking and baking, and film photography are among our passions.

We find AARC to be a warm, welcoming, and unpretentious community. And Rabbi Ora rocks!

As a special treat, Rabbi Ora requested that we share this lovely poem written by my daughter, Sarah Flint Erdreich:

Inheritance

dark eyes contemplative
behind gold rimmed glasses
corners of mouth hidden
by graying beard

my father
Army brat in Germany after the war
bad place to be a Jew
I used to picture him,
dark haired and slender,
never saying what he was
watching the flame of Sabbath candles
in Army-issue house

my mother stayed home
packed school lunches, ironed clothes
lively and laughing
in her Southern family
the skeletons left the closet
to have dinner with the living

my father left before I rose
worked late in the hospital
where he touched Death
at breakfast I ate the same meal
he, an hour earlier, consumed
wanting to be just like him

a photo taken in Switzerland
father bundled in a snowsuit
only solemn face visible
we could have been twins
at 7 years old

“enjoy life” he tells me
doing his best to ensure that I
who have inherited so much from him
will leave the sadness and silence
to the past that created it

– Sarah Flint Erdreich

Filed Under: Member Profiles Tagged With: new members, welcome

Welcome Pritchard Family!

January 5, 2020 by Gillian Jackson

Clare and Andy Pritchard with their daughters, Elena and Maggie.

Our family is glad to have found AARC. Our names are Clare (that’s me), Andy, Elena (age 8) and Maggie (age 6). Andy and I are from Michigan originally and lived in Ann Arbor for about 10 years before moving to Maine for work. We had our children in Maine and moved back to make Ypsi our home in 2016.

We’ve been dabbling in Jewish activities/congregations in the area but feel most comfortable at AARC. Thank you for welcoming us to your community! Our kids LOVE beit sefer and we look forward to being involved over the years. It is also special to note that I first heard about AARC through my good friend Allison Ivey, who I met at Habonim Dror Camp Tavor back in 1997!


My background is in nursing and I currently work at IHA in Clinical Operations. Andy is a public health professional who works as an Independent Consultant. We enjoy the outdoors, traveling, the Corner Brewery, Cultivate, making things with our hands, and making the world a better place. 

Filed Under: Member Profiles Tagged With: new members

Congratulations to our Graduates!

June 23, 2019 by Gillian Jackson

Avi Lessure senior portrait.

Avi Engelbert Lessure, son of Carol Lessure and Jon Engelbert, graduated from Skyline High School, where he was involved in robotics and math mentoring. He enjoys working with children, serving as a madrich in the AARC Beit Sefer, and seeks to tutor students in math over the summer. He is also a competitive Hearthstone player, having qualified to play against the world’s best during the Masters Tour in both Las Vegas (June) and Seoul, Korea (August). Avi will attend the University of Michigan Honors College in the fall.   

______________________________________________________________________________

Zevi Kinberg-Cowan graduated from Huron High School in June 2019. She’s looking forward to visiting relatives this summer, finding a job, and living her best life. 

______________________________________________________________________________

Juliana Fried is graduating from Pioneer High school and will attend Western Michigan University in the fall to study elementary education, with a concentration in math. She was awarded the AAPS Dorothy Russell Scholarship for a graduating senior who plans to enter the field of education. 

______________________________________________________________________________

Ella Edelstein is headed to the University of Michigan
Jesse Edelstein is headed to Brown University

______________________________________________________________________________

Ari Basch graduated from Huron High School in June 2019 with Honors. He played clarinet in Huron’s Symphony Band and led the Computer Aided Design (CAD) on the Ratpack FIRST Robotics team. Outside of school, he enjoys music, soccer, mountain biking and ultimate Frisbee. He built his mountain bike prior to heading to the UP for a riding camp, and he plays on multiple Ultimate teams. This summer, Ari is a counselor-in-training at Camp Loookout. He will be attending University of Michigan in the fall to study engineering.

______________________________________________________________________________

Other High School Graduates:

  • Daniel Hirshbein
  • Elijah Shore
  • Ahava Kopald

College Graduates:

  • Isaac Shore
  • Myisha Kinberg

Congratulations to all our high school and college graduates!

Filed Under: Member Profiles, Simchas

Jacob Resnick’s Bar Mitzvah Dvar: K’doshim

May 19, 2019 by Gillian Jackson

Shabbat Shalom and good morning. Today, I’ll be teaching you about my Torah portion K’doshim, which is in the book of Leviticus.

K’doshim means holy in hebrew. In my Torah portion, God gives Moses many commandments to give to the Israelites, the first one being, “You shall be holy.” Some of the commandments are basic rules that most of us still try to follow today like “You shall not steal” or “your shall not defraud your fellow”.


Others are more dated like “You shall not pick your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen fruits of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the stranger.” This commandment is dated because most of us don’t have vineyards now, but as Jewish people we like to take principles from the Torah and see how we can apply them to today’s world. With the law about leaving fallen fruit for strangers, I think this ancient law can teach us to not be greedy and save some of our wealth to give to people who don’t have much.

Another similarly dated commandment in my Torah portion is, “ If anyone insults either their mother or father he shall be put to death.” Instead of killing disrespectful children, today we have other less extreme punishments like getting grounded, but the principle of respecting your parents is still applied today.

The commandment or law from my Torah portion that I want to focus on today is a prohibition against worshipping Molech, where God tells Moses,

”Say further to the Israelite people: Anyone among the Israelites, or among the strangers residing in Israel, who gives any of his offspring to Molech, shall be put to death; the people of the land shall pelt him with stones. And I will set My face against that man and will cut him off from among his people, because he gave of his offspring to Molech and so defiled My sanctuary and profaned My holy name.”

If you didn’t know, Moloch is the name of a biblical Canaanite god. Moloch is usually depicted as a statue of a person with a bull’s head, and a furnace in its belly. Biblical historians believe the Canaanites worshipped Molech by offering it their children to be burned as sacrifices.

The Canaanites were an ancient people who lived in the land of Canaan, an area which most likely included parts of modern-day Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria and Jordan. The Canaanites were neighbors to the ancient Israelites once the Israelites entered the Land of Israel. So clearly, it was a concern that the Israelites might start to take on Canaanite traditions, including child sacrifice.

In my Torah portion alone the prohibition against Molech is mentioned four times.

Rabbi Ora taught me that it is not common in the Torah for words or ideas to be repeated without a reason. So the question I had is – Why is this law against worshipping Molech and child sacrifice repeated by God so many times?

I feel like God mentions this law so many times because it’s such a sensitive moral issue. We know that the Ten Commandments outlaw killing in general. The killing of anyone is wrong, but it is especially difficult to read of parents killing their children, because the child doesn’t have a choice and the child has no possible hope of a future.

I think God repeated the prohibition against Molech so many times because God needed to let the Israelites know that sacrificing your child is an unforgivable crime.

As someone who is adopted, and thinking more about this commandment, I see some connections between ancient children not having a choice on whether they got sacrificed, and me not having a choice on whether I was adopted. Obviously being adopted is not the same thing as being sacrificed, but there are some similarities.

One big similarity is that being adopted means being picked up and moved, not having a say on what’s going on. Being adopted means leaving this whole other life behind that you don’t even get a chance to try. Looking more into this law it was like looking into my life, and questions came up: Questions like not knowing why I was being given up, which was probably similar to the biblical kids not knowing why they were being sacrificed.

So, some of the challenges of being adopted are not having a choice, not knowing why you were being given up, and leaving a whole other life behind. Those are all the hard aspects of adoption, but there are more good ones. If I wasn’t adopted then I wouldn’t have met all the people in this room today, my friends, family, and this congregation. I probably wouldn’t have the great education and privileges I have today. I also wouldn’t be able to embrace being Jewish which I’m proud to be.

To me there’s nothing wrong with being adopted because I’m probably having a better life than if I wasn’t adopted.

Despite this, when I introduce myself as being adopted to other people, I notice people often seem to feel some discomfort in talking about it. Sometimes I get the response of, “Oh I’m so sorry for you.” I sometimes think that in that moment people are imagining themselves in my position and thinking about what would be different for them if they had been adopted. This could make them feel sad so then they say they are sorry for me. Or maybe they just feel uncomfortable with something that’s unfamiliar and don’t know what to say.

I’m speaking about my adoption today — the things that are hard about being adopted and the things that are good — and how I feel about it because I would like people to not get uncomfortable when talking to me about it. I want to let everyone know that I am comfortable having conversations about being adopted. I’m not necessarily saying that I want to talk about my adoption all the time but I am saying that when the topic does come up naturally I want both sides to feel comfortable when talking about it.

In our congregation, we have a custom of asking the community a question to generate discussion towards the end of a dvar Torah. I have 2 questions for you today.

The first question I have is, are there other contemporary issues where children don’t have control over what happens to them and they are penalized because of it?

The second one is, are there any topics that you feel are hard to talk about that shouldn’t be that hard to talk about?

Thank you all for your answers and a good discussion.

To conclude, I would like to thank Caroline, my mom, and Paul, my dad, for being there for me, and the rest of my family for coming today. Our great Rabbi Ora for helping me prepare my dvar Torah and having good conversations with me about my Torah portion. Deb who has helped me learn my Torah portion, my Haftorah, and the blessings that go with them. All my friends for supporting me and making me laugh. Martha our exchange student who puts up with me when I’m crazy. Lyndon who helps me practice my bass and Derek who is the best bass teacher in the world. My congregation who has been welcoming since the time I joined it. And finally thank you all for coming, Shabbat Shalom!

Filed Under: Divrei Torah, Member Profiles, Posts by Members Tagged With: Bar mitzvah

Honoring Marc Lerner

March 11, 2019 by Gillian Jackson

Written by Rick Solomon

Marc, behind his Ypsilanti apartment, March 11, 2010.
Photo: Lon Horwedel, AnnArbor.com

Marc Alan Lerner, September 22, 1951 – February 17, 2019.

Marc, son of (deceased) Betty and Ben Lerner, died from complications of Multiple Sclerosis. He was an author, poet, spiritual seeker, and finder. For thirty years, Marc engaged with his MS in a way that allowed him to not only cope with the disease but to transcend it and arrive at a spiritual philosophy—called Life Skills—that he shared through his books and blogs, for the benefit of others facing a chronic illness. His motto was, “To Struggle is to Grow.” His poetry and writing expressed a mystical love for God. He bore the burden of his disease with an uncomplaining grace that caused him to be described as “re-marc-able.” All who knew him loved him, and he loved us all in return.

Marc was a loving and wonderful husband, brother, uncle, and friend. He will be missed, but he has become a part of who we are. In 2005, as his MS worsened, he moved to Ann Arbor to be nearer to family. Soon after moving, he met the love of his life, Amy Rosenberg, and they became life partners. He continued writing books and poetry, and inspired all who met him to be their better selves.

In 2014 he developed trigeminal nerve damage, one of the most painful medical conditions of MS. He underwent brain surgery, became wheelchair bound, and felt close to death. Facing that struggle with courage, inner wisdom, love, and creativity, he wrote two books about the end of life, The End: A Creative Way to Approach Death and A Poetic View of Hospice. All his books are available atmarclerner.com.

To know Marc was to love him. He was a kind, gentle, and sensitive man who had an amazing capacity for intimacy and wonder. “Amazing” and “incredible” were his favorite words. Despite chronic pain, blindness, and disability, he was creative and witty, with an always present and positive spirit. He never complained about his MS but accepted it as his teacher, as a way to help him go deeper into what he called “the wisdom of the body,” the deepest intuitive source for healing the mind even when the body is broken. He formed deep, lasting bonds of love and friendship; he will be especially missed by his wife, Amy Rosenberg; his brother Dennis and his wife Cindy; brother Rob and his wife Ina; his sister Linda and her husband Rick Solomon; his nieces and nephews; his devoted friend and caregiver Eeta Gershow and friend Michael Andes; his men’s group, and the many followers of his skilled, spiritual approach to life.

Filed Under: Member Profiles, Poems and Blessings, Posts by Members Tagged With: obituary

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