When I first discovered the YAWS group (the acronym for parents of young adults who struggle), I didn’t know what I wanted from it.  I just knew that it was important that I attend, and I expected that I would figure out the why as I went along.  What I quickly came to experience was that it was a safe haven unlike any gathering that I had previously encountered.  Conceived of and led by a courageous temple parent, and with the support of temple clergy, this group welcomes not the struggling young adults who have already had untold opportunities, but their parents who have suffered so much, mostly in silence and emotional isolation.

Our son was in his mid-teens at the time that I discovered the YAWS group.  His Autism Spectrum Disorder (read incurable and life-long), had not been diagnosed until he was 12.  From the time he was six, when we began to worry that his was more than an attentional problem, I had been consumed with trying to understand him and provide him with every conceivable means to have a “normal” life.

Parents who attend the YAWS group have sons and daughters not only with Autism Spectrum Disorders but also bi-polar and other serious mental disorders, severe depression and life-threatening eating disorders, alcohol and drug problems, etc.  Some have been hospitalized; others incarcerated. Many have attended, even graduated, from prestigious universities.  We the parents had all started out with the usual high hopes reflective of our professional, high functioning community.  As our children’s challenges unfolded, our hopes of course had to alter accordingly.  Our success is getting to accept that what’s most important for our young adult children is not to be a professional with multiple degrees, a large bank account, a spouse and children, but to be as independently functioning as possible, to be kind and respectful with others, and to have some satisfying, enjoyable work or other activity, and a few friends, i.e. to not be idle, angry and living in our basements.  And to know that they are loved by their parents.

While we the parents have all struggled with our own anguish, fear, sadness and shame, we have also managed to be genuinely happy for our family members and friends brimming over with pride and joy in their typical young adult’s latest accomplishments.  We learn to focus on our similarities with our friends and not on our differences; to take care of ourselves as individuals and to make as interesting and enjoyable a life for ourselves as we can. We are not only as good as our kid’s worst problem; we are as good as we can be, as individuals.

The YAWS group, unique in the entire Washington area, supports parents not only by providing a range of helpful resource information but, more importantly, a safe haven of empathy and understanding.  Thank you, Temple Sinai.

-Anonymous

Many Jewish families with children approaching their 13th birthday have likely thought about how best to approach planning for their Bar/Bat Mitzvah celebration.  Like any major event or family oriented party, a number of options are considered and usually it involves a lot of stress.

Our daughter, Rebecca is turning 13 this November and we too, considered various options, particularly once our Bat Mitzvah date was quickly approaching.  We had heard about the trip that Rabbi Roos does to Israel every summer since he joined the temple as Senior Rabbi.  On this trip, Rabbi Roos performs the Bat Mitzvah celebration in Jerusalem in a beautiful outside ceremony while escorting the entire group around Israel for almost two weeks.  After much discussion, this option became very attractive to us for the following reasons:

• we have a small extended family
• a big service and party was a poor fit for our family
• our resources would be better applied for family travel and exploration
• this might be a great way to better connect with Temple Sinai

We can safely report that taking this trip to Israel was the best family decision we ever made.  Our family of four (Steve, Sue, Rebecca and Julia) all went along with one grandparent (Carol).  We were joined by Rabbi Roos and his family along with two other Temple Sinai families who we did not know.  In total, this trip had two Bat Mitzvah celebrations.

The trip actually exceeded our already high expectations.  We developed great friendships with the other two families, watched our daughter become a Bat Mitzvah in Jerusalem looking over the old city and formed a closer bond with Rabbi Roos and his family.  We all know that Rabbi Roos is a great Rabbi but most congregation members likely do not know that he is very approachable, accommodating and an absolute pleasure to travel with.  Rabbi Roos was always lending a helping hand to the kids and to the grandparents on the trip.  He was there to provide our youngest daughter, Julia, an explanation about Yad Vashem so she could understand its importance and relevance in Jewish world history.  So, in terms of connecting with Temple Sinai…mission accomplished!

Despite the unrest occurring in Israel during our trip, we had absolutely no stress nor any issues.  The tour guide Rabbi Roos secured was one of the best guides I ever have had in all my travels.  All eight children on the trip bonded and spent as much time on land as they did in water.  The itinerary allowed for plenty of unscheduled time for you to explore as well as seeing the major sights such as Masada, the Dead Sea and key places in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.  Aside from the Bat Mitzvah, the most memorable part of the trip was gaining a deeper understanding of the Jewish people from antiquity to date, the birth of the Jewish state and the geo-political factors that drove it after World War 2.

While we have always considered ourselves “culturally” Jewish (or as they say in Israel, secular), we have attended temple on the high holy days.  After this trip, we have more of a calling to attend other services, do a Shabbat dinner and learn more of the prayers.  This was all driven by the time we spent in Israel with Rabbi Roos.  Not only do we feel more connected to him but also to our Judaism.

In summary, this trip touched our lives on many levels:

• It was the first big trip we took as a family
• We gained great insight into Israel and Jewish history
• Developed great new friendships
• Have better appreciation for being Jewish, our Temple and Rabbi Roos

We hope that you strongly consider this option when the time comes for your family.

-Sue and Steve Schiffman

Nina Borwick is a long-time Temple Sinai member, whose dedicated and active involvement in the Temple community enriched her life, her family’s, and the lives of those with whom she interacted. In June, Nina and her husband, Tony, will be moving to the Los Angeles area to embark on a new adventure in retirement and be closer to their daughter, Abigail, who lives and works there now.

Although we’re happy for Nina and Tony, the Library Committee, especially, is sorry to be saying goodbye to Nina, one of our longstanding and most active members.   An elementary school teacher, Nina’s love of books and her background in publishing led her to volunteer in the Temple Sinai Library.  The Used Book Sale at the Temple’s Chanukkah Mart, which involved selecting and organizing the books for the sale and being in the Library during the actual sale, was one of her many signature projects.  Another of her important roles was working with the Librarian and other volunteers to identify new books to add to the collection and to keep the book collections organized and in good condition.  Most recently, she tackled, along with another volunteer, the arduous task of culling old and out-dated books. Nina brings her considerable energy, drive, and commitment to all the volunteer activities in which she has been engaged since she and Tony joined Sinai in the late 1980s.  She will be greatly missed.

Nina’s first volunteer work for Temple Sinai was as a member of the Religious School Committee during the time their daughter Abigail was attending the school.  She later chaired the Kallot Committee and served on the Sisterhood Board as Recording Secretary.   Even when serving on other committees, Nina’s love of books showed. We have Nina to thank for starting the popular Author’s Roundtable and convincing some prominent authors to participate in the early years, including Dara Horn. When Nina takes on a project, it gets done!

In addition to her volunteer work, Nina is proud that she was in the first adult Bat Mitzvah class of 11 women, leading to her Bat Mitzvah in 1993.  Nine of the women plus Rabbi Portnoy formed a book club that has continued to this day.

Those of us on the Library Committee count Nina as a loyal and loved friend, as do so many others at Temple Sinai, including her book group colleagues, her kallah, and members of Sisterhood.  We all wish Nina and Tony well as they enter their new stage of life.

Nina was interviewed by Herb Mintz for this article

When we joined Temple Sinai 40+ years ago, Marvin and I were eager to connect with a Jewish community for ourselves and especially for our four young children.  Almost from the beginning, he served on various committees and for some years was an officer on the Temple Board.  Clearly his desire to be formally involved was far stronger than mine.

Because I had been raised in a New York City Jewish family with no synagogue affiliation, I had no clear idea of what, if anything, I wanted to do as a part of the temple community.  Primarily my main focus was to support the efforts of the religious school and the youth group for the sake of my kids and to do as much as I could at home to express our Jewishness by celebrating the holidays and, above all, by making the most of all our lifecycle events as they came along. (Fortunately we had a lot of success in this latter area as different Sinai rabbis saw our children through B’nei Mitzvah, Confirmation, three out of four weddings and eventually baby namings for five of our grandchildren.)

Once all our children were in school full time, I returned to the workplace. That gave me yet another reason to shy away from accepting any Temple commitments that meant holding an office or attending regular meetings.  Instead I volunteered for one-time-only assignments such as organizing a white elephant sale, writing an occasional Sisterhood column for the Newsletter, baking and cooking for special occasions, and hosting fund-raising dinners for Sinai House.

Then about 30 years later, when I decided to stop working, I set out to do some meaningful volunteering. Becoming active in Sisterhood hadn’t occurred to me, however, until the day I received a call asking me to become a member of the Board.  At that point I said “yes” mainly because I had no excuse to say “no.”

Once involved, it became apparent to me that the women meeting in the library during our monthly Sunday morning sessions approach their work with the same energy and passion I had seen at the office.  Their mission to serve the Temple, the Washington community and the greater community clearly comes from the heart. And they are constantly searching for new ways not only to expand their reach but also to attract new members who bring new ideas and new enthusiasm to the table.

It was at that same table more than a year ago that we first discussed resurrecting the idea of a Sisterhood retreat weekend – but with a new approach more suited to the taste of today’s women.  As a Co-Chair of this effort to encourage connection both among Temple Sinai women and with our clergy, I can tell you that we achieved all that we hoped for. The 52 women who came together at a Baltimore inn to worship, study, dine and relax now comprise a core group that Sisterhood will be working to expand in the years to come.

This experience is especially gratifying for me as it gives new meaning to my long association with Temple Sinai.  In addition, it proves beyond doubt that the more you give to an organization, the more you get back in return.

-Sally Kranz

Second generation Holocaust survivor – a compelling part of my identity and that of many of my friends growing up in Bayside, NY. It came with a determination to never forget our history and to always make our parents proud of us and of our upholding our Jewish traditions.

The shul that I grew up in was essentially conservadox. While religious school attendance was mandatory for my sister and me the instruction was minimal. What I really yearned for was to be up on the bima with my father, which of course was not permitted. Years later, when it came time for my husband Scott and me to join a congregation here in Washington, we reflexively joined one much like my childhood shul.

Our children attended nursery school there and occasionally Scott and I would attend services. Yet we never really felt that we fit in. Finally, when our eldest daughter began bat mitzvah preparation we made the big move over to Temple Sinai. Still, I worried about what dad would think of it. He had always been a believer in women’s rights, yet I knew that that belief did not extend to the shul. He reluctantly attended the bat mitzvah and it was not until the end of the service, when he pronounced “I liked it” that I breathed a sigh of relief.

Soon after we joined the congregation I was invited to sit on the bima which pleased me immensely but I essentially coasted and remained uninvolved for the next few years. Finally, in 2004 I joined the adult b’nai mitzvah group. It was a time in my life when I realized that my aging parents would be gone one day and that I needed to do my part to feel comfort and at home in my temple community. And I still wanted to make my father and mother proud. My opportunity came with the preparation needed for my first torah reading after my adult bat mitzvah. I called my father every day to practice the parasha, and would hear him say that he was proud of me as I chanted. It was a milestone in my life and I believe in his as well. Son or daughter, I was carrying on a tradition that he had suffered to preserve.

The moral of this story is you reap what you sow. For several years Scott and I attended High Holiday and occasional Shabbat services but it was not until I dedicated myself to making an effort to contribute that I developed my strong connection to Temple Sinai. Now, as Executive Vice President of Sisterhood, I take great pleasure in connecting with other women in the planning of interesting and meaningful programming that benefits the entire temple community. And what an opportunity it was for me to serve as Co-Chair of the first TSWRJ Retreat and welcome others to become connected and develop their own feeling of familiarity and comfort with our Temple Sinai community.

-Ilana Gordon

Richard and I joined Temple Sinai about 30 years ago, moving from another congregation in the area, primarily because we were drawn to Rabbi Lipman as an intellectual and spiritual leader. Our sons had
already celebrated their Bar Mitzvahs and Confirmations so there was no chance of our becoming involved in and meeting people through the religious school. At the time we knew only two couples who were
members, one of whom invited us to join Kallah Chai. What a gift that invitation has been!

Today – 30 years later – we consider this small group our central temple community and in many ways part of our extended family. We do everything possible to be free for our meetings held on the third Sunday
of the month (except when it changes!) when we engage in provocative discussions on topics that have ranged over the years from Torah study to Jews in the arts to finding spirituality — a perpetual search for “Kallah Chai-niks,” as we call ourselves. We celebrate holidays, and happy family events together and provide comfort and support to each other during illnesses and at times of mourning.

While I feel part of several “communities” at the temple – as a board member, as a member of the most recent B’nai Mitzvah class and as a participant in the WRJ retreat -the members of Kallah Chai remain my core community.

-Elaine Binder

Ten years ago when my wife Kathryn and I joined Temple Sinai, I would have said that the chances that by 2014 Temple Sinai would be at the core of our lives, and that I would be serving my second term on
the Temple Board of Trustees, were only slightly greater than the chances that we move to an Ashram in Vermont or to Kathryn’s home state of Texas where I would study to be a rodeo clown. I grew up in a virtually agnostic family; Kathryn is not Jewish (although we decided to raise our boys Jewish); and I never considered myself to be in any way religious or spiritual.

Yet, I knew for many years that I had a longing to explore Judaism and spirituality. Temple Sinai has given me that opportunity, and, at the same time, has provided me and my family with a community that I now cannot imagine living without.

This journey began with a simple question that I posed to Rabbi Fred Reiner ten years ago at a cocktail party to welcome new members: “what is the best way of getting integrated into the Temple community?” Rabbi Reiner offered a simple answer: “volunteer to get involved in something that interests you.”

This opportunity presented itself several months later at a meeting for parents of new students in the Religious School. Then-Chair of the Religious School Committee Rosann Wisman spoke, and encouraged parents to sign up to volunteer to assist with a variety of Religious School activities and programs. I filled out the form, and, at the end of the meeting, introduced myself to Rosann. I told her that I was interested in serving on the Religious School Committee. Slightly surprised (I think), but unfazed, Rosann encouraged me to attend the first meeting, and told me that the makeup of the committee would then be solidified.

So I attended the first meeting, and then the second, and then the third, having decided to just keep attending until Rosann told me to stop. The meetings were great: I found the committee members to be thoughtful, smart, and extremely dedicated to doing whatever they could to make the school as good as it could be. But perhaps more than anything I enjoyed the opportunity to get to know members of the temple that until then I’d had no contact with, and to begin to feel – just a bit – the sense of community that was a large part of what I was hoping to find at Temple Sinai.

I ultimately solidified my position on the committee, and extended the path that I had found myself on by volunteering to assist Rosann in preparing and presenting to others the Religious School budget: a job for which I was utterly unqualified, but which Rosann and I muddled through together, and bonded in the process.

Since then, I have worked with fellow lay leaders on a number of task forces and committees; I have ushered at services; I have sold coffee and bagels at the Kesher Café; and I have been just one of the many foot-soldiers who keep Temple Sinai working, and growing, and thriving. It has sometimes been challenging to balance my legal career, family, and work on behalf of the Temple and each has sometimes paid a price in the process.

However, what I have gotten from my investment of time and energy on behalf of the temple has been infinitely greater than I have given. Through this investment I have discovered a community in which I have close friends, including among the clergy and other lay leaders, and a place where, more than anywhere in the world other than our home, I have come to feel is a place of welcome, of comfort and, indeed, a place of sanctuary. And it all started, ten years ago, with a simple question, and the simple act of getting involved.

-Ed Schwartz

I’d never heard it before: someone singing the Torah. A woman, no less! I didn’t know chanting existed, had never heard of trope. It was mysterious and beautiful. It was awesome. But this story isn’t really about chanting Torah. It’s about singing at Temple Sinai.

My husband Sherm Edwards and I had joined the synagogue when it became time to give our young children a religious orientation. Years later, with the children launched, we considered joining the choir. For us, it was an empty nest move. It also provided an answer to our lessened sense of connection to the synagogue once our children were no longer “bringing us” there for Religious School. A key to our decision: no audition. While both of us had played instruments as children, neither of us is trained in voice. Not only that, the High Holy Day music fills several binders. It’s daunting. But we were warmly welcomed into the choir, and assured we would eventually get it—after a few years! And so it has proven true. We mostly know the music, six or seven years into it. And I now sit next to that very same “chantress,” Nelly Urbach, whose voice had long ago drawn me in.

Rehearsing with the choir as the holidays approach instills in us a sense of preparing for the Days of Awe. It has increased the spirituality of the season for both of us. Rehearsals are hard work, but we are carried along by a wonderful camaraderie and good laughs. We love hearing the beautiful voices of our fellow choir members. And when I attend services at any other time of the year, I have the pleasure of knowing many more of the songs.

In addition to the High Holy Days, the choir sings at Shabbat Shira and other special events. Recently, we joined choirs from 22 metro area congregations to commemorate Kristallnacht at Strathmore Hall. Singing in the choir at Temple Sinai is one of the best kept secrets. To my mind, it’s the very best way to experience the High Holy Days, and a wonderful way to be part of Temple Sinai.

-Melinda Salzman

In 2008, my older brother died after several years of illness. A close friend, a temple member, asked if I would be sitting Shiva. I was initially taken aback at the suggestion. Although my wife, children, and I had long been members of the temple, I was not then Jewish and my deceased brother wasn’t either. Wasn’t a goy sitting Shiva for a deceased goy somehow, well, inappropriate?

A practical consideration then began to sway me. Because the funeral would be out of town, none of my local friends would be in attendance, and so it would be convenient–”nice,” I thought–to have a local opportunity to see them and take comfort from them. I talked with Rabbi Portnoy, and she assured me that there would be nothing inappropriate about it, and so I decided to do it. Rabbi Portnoy came to the house, and conducted a Shiva service with 30 or so of our close friends, many of whom were temple members.

“Nice” turned out to be a far too inadequate word. As Rabbi Portnoy led my family, friends, and me in the blessings and the prayers, I felt comfort and solace. The service was warm, supportive and moving. Sharing my grief lifted my sense of loss. Perhaps the most remarkable thing was that I drew this comfort from a ritual that was not part of my personal tradition. But it resonated with me nonetheless, and it was exactly what I needed at that time.

From this experience, I learned that the purpose of sitting Shiva is not to provide some kind of testimonial to the Jewishness of the deceased or his survivors–obviously inapplicable in my situation. It is rather the exercise of a lesson learned over the centuries, that what a mourner needs most of all is the collective strength of a congregation through a ceremony by which, through shared participation, the members reassure the mourner that we feel your loss, we share your pain, we are here for you. It is a precious gift.

Although my Shiva experience would have stood on its own in life, it was, in fact, a key factor in a decision that I had been contemplating for some time. Shortly thereafter, I converted to Judaism, and this past summer, I became a Bar Mitzvah.

-Bob Loesche

R. Yochanan ben Zakkai, known for his powers to heal, got sick one day. R. Hanina visited him, held out his hand, and R. ben Zakkai stood up. A student asked why, if R. ben Zakkai was such a great healer, he couldn’t heal himself. The Rabbi answered with the metaphor: “Because the prisoner cannot free himself from prison.” Babylonian Talmud, Berakoth 5 One month after celebrating my Bat Mitzvah with my Temple Sinai Dibrot class I suffered a unexpected heart attack. The shock of it, the fear and confusion of living in a formerly fit, now weakened body, and the emotional isolation were all there, and very overwhelming. Also there were my classmates—visiting, feeding, shopping, driving, even gardening for me. And the clergy. They were all my R. Hanina. Judaism views illness as a spiritual teacher and community as the comforting, compassionate healing presence of the other and this was undoubtedly my experience, not only then but again and again with other related medical situations. The Sisterhood, the clergy, the staff and lay leadership, and always the Dibrot. This is what Temple Sinai has come to mean to me – a wise, thoughtful, caring, compassionate community.

-Marcie Solomon