Purim Pushes us Out of our Comfort Zone — and Why That’s Holy
by Rabbi Nathan Kamesar Hag Purim same’ah — a joyous and festive Purim holiday! See below for a teaching I offered Friday night on the spiritual importance of pushing ourselves out of our comfort zones every once in a while, an experience which Purim facilitates. What follows is the Purim drash I delivered this past […]
Standing at the Shore Together
by Rabbi Nathan Kamesar Dear Friends, It was fun for our community to get profiled this week in the Jewish Exponent! I hope you’ll check it out and share. Meanwhile, I wanted to share with you the D’var Torah I offered this past Shabbat on the eve of long-time member Evan Schwartz Chrismer becoming Bar Mitzvah: […]
The Power of Community in Challenging Moments
by Rabbi Nathan Kamesar I had hoped this week to simply share with you the D’var Torah I delivered this past Friday night to welcome our 61 new member households who joined over the past year, on the experience of entering a new community, and on the importance, in Jewish tradition, of welcoming and togetherness. […]
Aheinu — Holding Space for One Another
by Rabbi Nathan Kamesar One English word used today to describe the work of a rabbi is “pastoral.” Pastoral is a word whose origins derive from the nomadic, shepherding origins of our people, and today it refers to a form of accompaniment — to, as Rabbi Dayle Friedman writes, offering “a spiritual presence to people […]
It’s Just Us
by Rabbi Nathan Kamesar We need your help. When I first applied to rabbinical school back in 2013, operating as I was from something of the periphery of the Jewish community, I did not imagine that, post-rabbinical school, I would be the rabbi of a synagogue. The conventional wisdom at the time (and in some […]