Calendar

Young children and their parents celebrate Shabbat with singing, movement, blessings, and storytelling. We touch on the main highlights of the Shabbat morning service: wonder, fun, song, listening to the world, dancing, and Torah. Afterwards, we enjoy an informal potluck nosh and the chance to play and schmooze. Led by Deborah Eisenbach-Budner.

Please RSVP here by Wednesday, Jan. 31.

Young children and their parents celebrate Shabbat with singing, movement, blessings, and storytelling. We touch on the main highlights of the Shabbat morning service: wonder, fun, song, listening to the world, dancing, and Torah. Afterwards, we enjoy an informal potluck nosh and the chance to play and schmooze. Led by Deborah Eisenbach-Budner.

Please RSVP here.

During March Movie Night on Sunday, March 18, Havurah Shalom’s Ma’avar Committee will show “Living While Dying,” a film made by P’nai Or member Cathy Zheutlin.

Here is a brief description of the film: Death is a big mystery, and yet the outcome is 100 percent certain. How do you plan for the unknown? Filmmaker Cathy Zheutlin tells the stories of four friends with terminal illness who chose to live out their final days at home with creativity humor and courage. One might think that it would be depressing or morose. In fact, just the opposite – it is loving, hopeful and and full of joy. Despite cultural norms that death is meant to be vanquished, “Living While Dying” transforms sorrow and fear into inspiration and beauty. It honors what University of California San Francisco palliative care physician BJ Miller says, that “dying is a human act, not just a medical one.”

The film will be followed by a panel discussion with some experts in end-of-life care, many of whom are Havurah members.

Panelists include:

• Rabbi Benjamin
• Charles Blanke – Havurah member and OHSU oncologist specializing in end-of-life care and death with dignity
• Karen Erde -Havurah member and palliative care physician
• Susan Hedlund – Manager of Patient and Family Support Services at the OHSU Knight Cancer Institute. She has over 30 years of experience in oncology and hospice care, and worked on the original task force to legalize death with dignity.

A suggested donation of $10 will directly help the filmmaker so she can continue to pay for the production of this very beautiful and important film.

Please RSVP at tinyurl.com/Live-HS.

Community Sukkah Building

Help build our community Sukkah! Fun for kids and adults! Bring your own decorations or create some while you are here to hang up in the Sukkah! An adult supervises all activities.

Pizza in the Sukkah

Join friends and family for an evening of great food, schmoozing, singing, and storytelling!

Cost: $15 per family.
Register by Sept. 23: oregonjcc.org/sukkah

In partnership with PJA

Pianist David Rothman in Recital

Piano virtuoso David Rothman tackles the masterworks of composers Ludwig van Beethoven and Frederic Chopin. The four-part concert series that began in September returns to the J’s  December schedule for the final two performances.

David Rothman was born in Toronto, Canada, in 1962. At age 6, he began to study piano, and he was accepted into the Menuhin School in England at age 10. At 17, he was accepted into the Curtis Institute where he studied with Mieczyslaw Horszowski.

Thursdays, Dec. 13 + 20

Cost: $10. Member Cost: $5.
Register: oregonjcc.org/pianoconcert

Pianist David Rothman in Recital

Piano virtuoso David Rothman tackles the masterworks of composers Ludwig van Beethoven and Frederic Chopin. The four-part concert series that began in September returns to the J’s  December schedule for the final two performances.

David Rothman was born in Toronto, Canada, in 1962. At age 6, he began to study piano, and he was accepted into the Menuhin School in England at age 10. At 17, he was accepted into the Curtis Institute where he studied with Mieczyslaw Horszowski.

Thursdays, Dec. 13 + 20

Cost: $10. Member Cost: $5.
Register: oregonjcc.org/pianoconcert

Her novel alternates between late medieval Spain and Portugal during the traumatic time of the Inquisition, and a very small town in New Mexico in 1992. The modern New Mexican characters are Catholics with peculiar habits. Nobody in town eats pork but they don’t know why. It is likely they are the descendants of conversos, Jews who converted during the Spanish Inquisition. The story weaves a connecting thread from the Iberian Peninsula to Mexico City and then on to the original settlers who moved into what is now the American Southwest. Five hundred years later, a young amateur astronomer wonders about the secret of the town he grew up in: Entrada de la Luna, or Gateway to the Moon.

Morris’ previous work, The Jazz Palace, won the Anisfeld-Wolf Book Award for important contributions to the understanding of racism in 2016. She also writes short stories and travel memoirs. Her many novels and story collections have been translated into six languages. She lives in Brooklyn, New York and teaches writing at Sarah Lawrence College.

Doors open at 4:00 PM to meet and greet the author. A one-hour author reading and discussion will follow beginning at 4:30 PM. Light refreshments will be served. Admission is free.

Co-sponsored by the Beit Am Jewish Community and the MJCC. Grassroots Bookstore will be there with copies of the paperback edition of Gateway to the Moon for sale and author signing.