Partly Strong, Partly Broken — Book Talk and Panel Discussion with Author Nathaniel Popkin, Rabbi Nathan Kamesar, and Journalist Hannah Filreis Albertine
Tuesday, Jun. 9 @ 7:00 pm
Registration is required of all attendees
Admission is included with Society Hill Synagogue Membership, and costs $10 for the General Public
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In the month leading up to October 7, 2023, a progressive rabbi tries desperately to hold her interfaith community together amid increasing clashes over politics, racism, and Israel. Partly Strong, Partly Broken, the new novel by Society Hill Synagogue member Nathaniel Popkin, tackles questions that have fractured countless families, friendships, and communities even before October 7th.
What does it mean to be a Jew in America today? How can the suffering in Gaza and Israel’s promise of refuge be reconciled? When core religious, personal, and political values conflict, how do people respond?
Come together for a book talk and panel discussion with author Nathaniel Popkin, Rabbi Nathan Kamesar, and journalist Hannah Filreis Albertine. Partly Strong, Partly Broken will be available to purchase and get signed by Nathaniel Popkin at the event.
Meet the Panelists:
Nathaniel Popkin
PARTLY STRONG, PARTLY BROKEN (2026) is Nathaniel Popkin’s fourth novel and eighth book.
He is also the co-editor of the anthology Who Will Speak for America? (2018). In the novels The Year of the Return (2019) and Everything Is Borrowed (2018) and in the book-length essay To Reach the Spring (2020), Popkin examines intersections of Jewish ideals and lived realities.
Formerly a writer of criticism for the Wall Street Journal, Kenyon Review, Public Books, and Cleaver Magazine, among other publications, Popkin’s essays have appeared in the New York Times, Tablet, and Gulf Coast. As an American urban historian, Popkin has been a significant voice on the past, present, and future of his home city of Philadelphia, where he is co-founder, with Peter Woodall, of the public history website Hidden City and co-author of two Hidden City books, Finding the Hidden City (2017) and the forthcoming Philadelphia In Color 1950-1990 (2026).
He is a producer and writer of multiple Emmy Award winning history documentaries, including Philadelphia: The Great Experiment (2011-2019), Sisters in Freedom (2018), and the ten-part series, In Pursuit: Philadelphia and the Making of America (2026). His studio, You’ll Never Forget Productions, co-founded with director Andrew Ferrett, is producing the nine-part series, For the Common Good: The Woman Who Shaped the Nation (2026).
Rabbi Nathan Kamesar
Rabbi Nathan S. Kamesar (he/him) is honored to serve as the Rabbi of Society Hill Synagogue. Rabbi Kamesar has served the community since 2014, first as Rabbinic Intern while in Rabbinical School, then as Associate Rabbi beginning in 2018, and as Senior Rabbi since 2020.
Rabbi Kamesar is proud of a number of accomplishments the Society Hill Synagogue community has made under his leadership, beginning with the move to an Immersive Shabbat Hebrew School experience, in which Hebrew School takes place on Shabbat mornings, students participate in the Torah discussion, and families stay for the Kiddush lunch. He further celebrates the move to a weekly TGIShabbat experience, in which every Friday evening, from September through May, the community gathers for Shabbat with music and dinner.
Rabbi Kamesar also served as a member of the Leadership Committee of the Center City Kehillah, a network of communities representing the diversity of Jewish life in urban Philadelphia. He is a member of both the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association and the Central Conference of American Rabbis. Rabbi Kamesar was ordained by, and received an M.A. in Hebrew Letters from, the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in 2018. While in rabbinical school, Rabbi Kamesar served as President of the Reconstructionist Student Association and was honored with the Tikkun Olam Award for service to the college community. He also earned an M.S. in Nonprofit Leadership at the University of Pennsylvania in 2016 and was selected by his classmates to be the graduation speaker for that program.
Before rabbinical school, Rabbi Kamesar was an attorney at the law firm, Skadden Arps. He earned his J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, in 2010. Prior to law school, Rabbi Kamesar served two years with AmeriCorps*VISTA in Baltimore and Washington, D.C. He is a proud Oregon Duck, having graduated magna cum laude from the University of Oregon in 2004 with a degree in Economics.
Rabbi Kamesar and his wife, Caroline, both grew up in the Philadelphia area and reside in Society Hill with their daughters, Lila and Nina. He loves reading, basketball, music, and life.
Hannah Filreis Albertine
