Dear Chevreh,
(The ongoing need for movemental healing is well-attested to by these two recent publications: today's NY Jewish Week OpEd by Jerome A. Chanes, "What Went Wrong With Conservative Judaism?" & last week's ejewishphilanthropy piece by Rabbi Eric M. Lankin, entitled "The Missing Piece.")
Over the last 9+ years, the ShefaNetwork has morphed many times, from an online conversation, to 3 conferences and a Learning Mission to the Conservative Yeshiva, to 9 journals, and, most recently to a book, archiving all of the journals for posterity. Shefa's website migrated from a yahoogroup to a formal website, and finally to the most recent incarnation as a blog: http://shefanetwork.blogspot.com/. There remains much work to be done before the mission of the ShefaNetwork, "to bring together dreamers from within the Conservative/Masorti Movement and to give their dreams an audible voice" is accomplished.
(The ongoing need for movemental healing is well-attested to by these two recent publications: today's NY Jewish Week OpEd by Jerome A. Chanes, "What Went Wrong With Conservative Judaism?" & last week's ejewishphilanthropy piece by Rabbi Eric M. Lankin, entitled "The Missing Piece.")
The important news is that that the two things everyone seems to agree upon - and care about - are:
- 1) Conservative Jews are the majority on the ground and in leadership positions in so many national and local Jewish efforts (Avodah, Hadar, Hazon, AJWS, NIF, AIPAC, T'ruah, etc...)
- 2) The vital middle Jewish stream must survive for the Jewish community to endure
May we all do our part in amplifying others' creative souls.
Kol Tuv,
Menachem