Profiles in Courage-A Kol Nidre Sermon
Two years after John F. Kennedy was elected Senator from Massachusetts, he wrote a book called Profiles in Courage that would win a Pulitzer Prize and also help propel this handsome young senator into the White House three years later. Kennedy, a history buff, chose to profile eight political figures whose courage while in office […]
Clergy Leadership Incubator (CLI): Shaping Visionary Spiritual Leaders by Rabbi Irwin Kula
Organizations throughout the American Jewish community are painfully aware that the strategies and programs that may have been effective for a previous generation will no longer meet the needs of the younger generation of Jews who have been raised in a dramatically different world than that of their parents or grandparents. Indeed, many of those […]
Gary Rosenblatt on Jewish Megatrends
Jewish Megatrends: Rabbi offers a new way to think of ourselves: “tribal,” and “covenantal” Gary Rosenblatt New York Jewish Week, 5/22/2013 Rabbi Sidney Schwarz recalls the exact words of a comment from a liberal rabbinical student that disturbed him profoundly. “We were at a retreat, and he said to me, ‘I didn’t go to […]
Q & A with the Religious News Service
Rabbi’s Message for American Jews: Change or Die Interview with Lauren Markoe posted on the Religious News Service (RNS) Rabbi Sidney Schwarz, ordained in the liberal Reconstructionist tradition, sees a divide between generations of American Jews that could spell disaster for the community. One generation he calls “legacy” or “tribal” Jews — those who built […]
Jewish Megatrends-On the Road, Part 2
In the past two weeks we held a beautiful book launch at my home shul, Adat Shalom Reconstructionist Congregation in Bethesda, MD and then I did events in New York and Boston. The New York event was held at the JCC of Manhattan, directed by my good friend, Rabbi Joy Levitt who is also […]
The Jewish Social Justice Bus
Last month I was invited to speak at the Jewish Funders Network’s (JFN) annual conference in Los Angeles. JFN has emerged as an important player in the American Jewish community. As Jewish Federation fundraising has been relatively stagnant for the last two decades, family foundations have emerged as a very important source of philanthropic venture […]
Jewish Megatrends: On the Road-part 1
I’ve just completed the first segment of a national book tour which will take me to ten cities over the next few months. Jewish Megatrends: Charting the Course of the American Jewish Future (Jewish Lights) was published March 1st and I just returned from my second trip to the West Coast where I spoke at […]
On Jewish Service
Periodically, I have the joy and privilege of leading services at Adat Shalom in Bethesda, MD. I am the founding rabbi of the congregation and on most shabbatot I am “in the pews” (even though we have individual seats and not pews). But when I conduct services it is also my prerogative to frame the Torah discussion. […]
A New Day, A New Website!
I thought writing a new book was a big undertaking! In some ways that was less challenging than launching a new website, which we are doing today, Feb. 28, 2013. My new book, Jewish Megatrends, has been long scheduled for release on March 1, 2013. I knew that it was important to create a more […]