Ryan and I did the L.A. supercasual thing for six or seven months. When I tried to rev up our relationship from supercasual to just plain casual, he freaked. I\’m talking full-on, take-it-to-Dr. Phil meltdown:
Over the next several months, it is going to be increasingly difficult to be dispassionate about \”The Passion.\”\n\nActor-director Mel Gibson\’s movie about the final 12 hours in the life of Jesus — recently renamed \”The Passion of Christ\” — will open nationwide on Feb. 25, Ash Wednesday. Last Thursday, the Anti-Defamation League\’s (ADL) Abe Foxman tossed more kindling on the prerelease flames by declaring, at an ADL panel discussion in New York City, that Gibson was \”seriously infected\” with anti-Semitic views.
Chauvinism, of one kind or another, probably has always been with us. This week\’s Torah reading, Parshat Vayera, for example, appears to lend itself to the charge of male chauvinism. The Torah tells us that the three angels who came to visit Abraham brought news that Sarah would give birth to Abraham\’s son. Sarah laughed when she heard this, whereupon God chastised her, saying to Abraham, \”Why is it that Sarah laughed … is anything too hard for the Eternal?\” (Genesis 18:13-14).
In a watershed event for the California central coast\’s small Jewish community, the Santa Barbara Jewish Federation marked the 65th anniversary of Kristallnacht by opening the city\’s first permanent Holocaust exhibit.
The opening shows just how far this small Jewish community has come.
For years, members of Mogen David, a traditional synagogue on Pico Boulevard near Beverwil Drive, watched young Orthodox families trek down the hill past the brick building at the westernmost end of the Pico-Robertson neighborhood on their way to other synagogues. Lay leaders of Mogen David, which according to the shul\’s executive director, Rabbi Gabriel Elias, had a dwindling membership of about 600 families — 80 percent of them older than 80 — knew that if they were to survive they would have to get those families in the front door.
So after much soul-searching and with a painful dose of pragmatism, the board decided four years ago to carve out separate men\’s and women\’s sections in the sanctuary, get rid of the microphones and start a search for a Modern Orthodox rabbi.
Drew Ullman, age 20, after two years at college in Santa Barbara, had announced that was putting college life on hold and would join the Marines. He heads to boot camp in January, and said he wishes he could go sooner. His father, a former anti-war activist and full-fledged liberal, said at one time he would have talked his son out of it. Now he realizes he couldn\’t be prouder.
\”My father and I have similar thinking,\” said Drew, who grew up in Beverly Hills and the West Valley, \”what we call our 9-10 and our 9-12 thinking. I feel like I owe a lot to this country, more so than someone who needs to go into the military as a way out. I grew up with money, with a great education, had a lot of advantages that other kids don\’t have, so I really owe a lot to this country.\”
The UCLA Hillel rabbi who allegedly lost his temper and kicked a freelance journalist who called him a derogatory name could be required to undergo anger management training, counseling or worse for his reported actions.
On Dec. 1, Rabbi Chaim Seidler-Feller and Rachel Neuwirth will meet separately with a city attorney hearing officer in Los Angeles to try to sort through the facts of his reported physical assault on her. Afterward, the hearing officer will mete out the appropriate punishment to Seidler-Feller, if merited, said Eric Moses, the city attorney\’s director of public relations. It is possible the hearing officer could recommend that criminal charges be brought against Seidler-Feller.
At Temple Congregation Ohabei Shalom in Nashville, Tenn., congregants newly trained in the ancient skill of shofar blowing sounded the ceremonial ram\’s horn for the first time this past Rosh Hashanah. It was the first time a lay member of the 150-year-old synagogue had blown the shofar.
\”It was quite a pivotal moment\” for the 800-family congregation, said its rabbi, Mark Schiftan.
Deeply rooted in classical Reform Judaism, the temple\’s services until recently were marked by choirs and English-only prayer. This Reform movement charter synagogue is undergoing upheaval, and it is not alone.
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