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- Written by: Rabbi Jonathan Kraus
It’s a Monday morning in early September. We’re at our weekly staff meeting. We are sitting around the large, conference table in the Temple library. It’s only six days until Rosh Hashanah, and this is our first, full staff meeting of the year. With religious school about to open, most of the congregation coming through the doors in less than a week, the program year beginning in earnest and a wonderful but brand new Temple Administrator to bring up to speed, we have a great deal of business to discuss.
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- Written by: Rabbi Jonathan Kraus
It’s a Friday evening towards the beginning of August and we’re at Shabbat services. We are sitting on benches outdoors, enjoying the soft light and warm air of an early, summer night in the Berkshire mountains. We’re surrounded by hundreds of Jewish children, most of them dressed in white. Some of those children have their arms around each other. All of us are singing together, the beautiful songs and prayers of the Shabbat evening service.
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- Written by: Rabbi Jonathan Kraus
I’m writing these words having just returned from a wonderful retreat for the Board of Trustees led by gifted Temple member, Jeffrey Korn. Our focus was on telling stories as an aspect of leadership—how we can use the stories we tell and the stories we’re privileged to hear in order to more effectively strengthen the life of this community.
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- Written by: Rabbi Jonathan Kraus
Recently, my daughter sent me a link to the video, "Kony, 2012" produced by the organization, Invisible Children. The half hour video seeks to educate people, especially young adults, about some of the terrible human rights abuses perpetrated by Joseph Kony and the "Lord's Resistance Army" (LRA) over more than two decades in Uganda and other countries of Central Africa. These horrors include the widespread kidnapping of children (more than 30,000 children when the LRA was active in Northern Uganda) to turn them into sex slaves or child soldiers (the latter, often beginning their indoctrination by being required to murder their parents).