Monthly Mitzvah Project
Each month the MJCC and PJA communities will collect items for the monthly mitzvah. Drop off items in the blue bin in the MJCC lobby. Check the display for how you can participate and donate to these worthy causes.
This project reflects the Jewish commitment to Tikkun Olam (repairing the world), providing opportunities to give back to our community.
Please drop off items in the blue bin in the MJCC Lobby.
October
Welcome Basket Items for teens moving out of homelessness
• Second Home (Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon)
Leonard Bernstein at 100 celebrates the life and work of Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990), the great Jewish American composer and conductor who dedicated his life to making classical music a vibrant part of American culture.The exhibition features photographs, personal items, papers, scores, correspondence, costumes, furniture, and audio and video recordings. A vocal booth gives visitors the chance to sing lead in West Side Story. The exhibition is the most comprehensive retrospective of Bernstein’s life and career ever staged in a museum setting.
Curated by the GRAMMY Museum at L.A. Live ® in collaboration with The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts and the Bernstein Family. Presented in cooperation with the Bernstein Family, The Leonard Bernstein Office, Inc., Brandeis University, and the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music.
Generous support for this exhibition is from the James F. and Marion L. Miller Foundation and the Collins Foundation.
Wise Aging for 55+ (NEW SERIES!)
This workshop series, developed by the Institute for Jewish Spirituality, is designed to help participants explore the years beyond mid-life as an opportunity for growth and discovery. Each session will include opportunities for personal sharing, contemplative listening, basic mindfulness practice, and Jewish text study. Participants will need to read the book Wise Aging: Living with Joy, Resilience and Spirit by Rabbi Rachel Cowan & Dr. Linda Thal (not included in the registration fee). Instructors: Christine Gilmore and Naomi Harwin.
Thursdays, October 10, 17, 24, 31
10:00 am – 12:00 pm, SI100
Cost: $125.
Register: oregonjcc.org/registration
Come study and discuss the Bible with Rabbi Isaak at Neveh Shalom.
This 18-week course is taught by members of The Oregon Board of Rabbis, representing a variety of Jewish affiliation. A carefully constructed curriculum includes Jewish history, life cycle events, holidays, ritual and daily practice, theology, study of Torah and contemporary Jewish America. While not a conversion class, most OBR members consider it a prerequisite for students beginning study for conversion. Classes 7-9 pm, Thursdays, at rotating Portland area synagogues. Register here, https://oregonboardofrabbis.org/introduction-to-judaism-class/
Monthly Mitzvah Project
Each month the MJCC and PJA communities will collect items for the monthly mitzvah. Drop off items in the blue bin in the MJCC lobby. Check the display for how you can participate and donate to these worthy causes.
This project reflects the Jewish commitment to Tikkun Olam (repairing the world), providing opportunities to give back to our community.
Please drop off items in the blue bin in the MJCC Lobby.
November
Thanksgiving Food Items for families in need
• JFCS (Jewish Family & Child Service) Clients
Fun Days off from School
Need something for your kids to do during school breaks? Keep them busy and having fun at the MJCC with sports, swimming, gymnastics, arts and crafts, games, and more! Kids must be potty-trained. Registration open now!
Ages 3-11
Half-Day: 8:00 am – 1:00 pm, Cost: $33. Member Cost: $28
Full-Day: 8:00 am – 5:30 pm, Cost: $60. Member Cost: $50
All campers must be fully potty trained. No exceptions.
We welcome campers from 8:00 – 9:00 am + begin programming at 9:00 am. For half-day campers, check out is at 1:00 pm.
For full-day campers, check out begins at 4:00 pm
and will continue through 5:30 pm.
Schedule for Vacation Day Camp
2019-20 – Register Today!
Oct. 1, 11, 14, 21, 22
Nov. 1, 11, 25, 26, 27
Dec. 23, 26, 27, 30, 31
Jan. 2, 3, 17, 20, 27
Feb. 17
March 13, 19, 20, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27
April 6, 8, 10, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17
May 8, 21, 22, 29
Full day: 8:00 am – 5:30 pm
Half day: 8:00 am – 1:00 pm
Contact Carli Rosenthal at 503.452.3436.
Intergenerational Trauma Workshop with Rabbi Tirzah Firestone, PhD
On Friday eve, November 1 and Saturday, November 2, the Havurah Synagogue hosts Rabbi Tirzah Firestone, PhD, author, Jungian psychotherapist and renowned Jewish scholar and teacher. Rabbi David Zaslow writes, “This is a workshop not to be missed if you are Jewish or from any minority community whose ancestors suffered the trauma of prejudice, anti-Semitism, or racism.” Friday eve, 7:30 PM, short teaching by Firestone. Saturday morning at 10:00 AM teaching followed by lunch and then afternoon workshops. Saturday evening at 7:30 PM Integration session. Fee for the weekend, including Friday eve dessert and light lunch on Saturday is $55 or Pay What You Can. No one turned away. For more info or to register https://havurahshirhadash.org/rabbi-tirzah-firestone-phd/. No walk-ins. The Havurah Synagogue is located at 185 N Mountain Ave., Ashland. 541-488-7716.
Raised in an Orthodox home in St. Louis, Missouri, Tirzah’s spiritual curiosity called her to search beyond the confines of her family’s strict Jewish upbringing. The younger sister of the groundbreaking radical feminist, Shulamith Firestone (The Dialectic of Sex, William Morrow & Co: 1970), Tirzah left home to embark upon a life-changing spiritual odyssey, chronicled in With Roots In Heaven: One Woman’s Passionate Journey into the Heart of Her Faith (Dutton, 1998).
After immersing herself in a wide variety of spiritual practices and world-views, Tirzah returned with fresh vigor to Jewish studies and became a rabbi in a pluralistic and egalitarian Judaism. Her studies in the feminine wisdom tradition and Jewish mysticism yielded The Receiving: Reclaiming Jewish Women’s Wisdom (Harper San Francisco, 2003). Her passion to share an inclusive and joyous Judaism led her to serve as a leader in the international movement for Jewish Renewal and on the board of Aleph: Alliance for Jewish Renewal. Tirzah’s passion for human rights and for the prophetic vision of Judaism led her to Rabbis for Human Rights, North America, now known as T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights.
Tirzah earned a masters degree in counseling at Beacon College in Boston, Massachusetts in 1982, and a doctorate in psychology at Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara, California in 2015. Her cutting edge research on the impact and healing of collective trauma draws on the fields of neuroscience, psychology, Jewish literature and mythopoesis. Her groundbreaking work called Wounds Into Wisdom: Healing Intergenerational Trauma (Monkfish, 2019) employs interviews, case studies, and her own autobiographical narratives to demonstrate how trauma residue passes from generation to generation and how it can be transformed.
Now Rabbi Emerita of her congregation, Tirzah maintains a private practice in depth psychology, and teaches nationally about modern applications of ancient wisdom and ancestral healing: how to transform patterns of suffering from our past and bring forth clarity, wisdom, and blessings for ourselves and those who come after us.
The blessings of our ancestors, as well as their painful patterns, lie dormant within each of us. We can honor yet transform our ancestral legacies and change the narratives of our lives. Join Rabbi Tirzah Firestone PhD to learn more about your family’s legacy, heal ancestral wounds, and reshape your destiny.
Wounds Into Wisdom, her newest book, makes a compelling case that trauma legacies can be transformed and healed. Fusing contemporary neuroscience, psychology, and ancient Jewish wisdom and values, this work provides a roadmap for Jews, and all individuals and groups with trauma history, who wish to seize the power to change their lives.
“Wounds into Wisdom is for anyone who has suffered trauma, either directly or in a family whose generational trauma is buried. It helps readers uncover suffering and use it to help others―the final stage of healing…” ―Gloria Steinem
Torah Troop for 3rd-5th Graders
1st and 3rd Shabbat every month at 10:00am
Torah Troop allows families at Congregation Neveh Shalom to move into the main sanctuary while still enjoying youth-oriented activity. At 10:00am, families meet in the main service. After the beginning Torah service, youth join their friends for a lesson on the Torah portion (parsha) of the week with adult leaders, and come back to help lead the Adon Olam at the end of the service.
As always, we end with our community for lunch!
Join us for a FREE fun and exciting evening with ORA’s talented artists. Be the first to preview and purchase the artists’ new and affordable art, including photography, fabric, fused glass, jewelry, paintings, pencil drawings, pottery, wood, sculpture, quilts and more. Refreshments will be available.
You can purchase art before the main event on Sunday the 3rd.