There are two reasons why March is my favorite month.
Reason #1: It’s Purim and Purim is my favorite holiday. Purim teaches us many valuable lessons about who we are as a people and how we can overcome adversities in our own lives. It’s a holiday about unity, community, family and togetherness. (more…)
TBS Social Action Committee – the Diane Kaplan Social Action Fund
Each month we plan to highlight each of our agencies so you may know more about what they do. Please continue to give generously to the fund. It allows us to support these agencies in the greater New Haven area.
This month we will focus on three programs that have been helping many in our community; IRIS, The Food Pantry of North Branford, and New Reach. (more…)
Click for February 2023 Bulletin. Will open with Adobe Reader or equal.
In last month’s Israel Matters!, we shared that Israel is ranked as the 5th safest country to visit in comparison with the world’s most popular tourist destinations. That’s certainly not what many people think! Besides being the 5th safest, there are a lot of other numbers that you may find surprising, interesting and/or impressive about Israel. We’ve included some of them here. (more…)
Donate to the Diane Kaplan Social Action Fund Each month we plan to highlight each of our agencies so you may know more about what they do. Please continue to give generously to the fund. It allows us to support these agencies in the greater New Haven area. This month we will focus on two programs that have been helping many in our community; our Knitting Group, and Pop Tabs for Ronald McDonald House. Ongoing Programs: Knitting Project: Helene Meltzer and a dedicated group of knitters have produced approximately 500 knitted items this year. The hats and scarves were donated to IRIS, New Reach and the Keefe Center. The knitting group has received heartfelt letters of thanks including one from BH Cares, an abuse center in Greater New Haven. New knitters are always needed. Ronald McDonald House: Gerry Ganezer has been collecting and bringing pop tabs to the Ronald McDonald…
I’ve been asked many times, “What does Judaism say about miracles?” Traditionally, miracles are understood to be a theophany, when G-d shows up and intervenes in our lives to change destiny. Whether it’s cracking open the sky to flood the world, or bringing forth manna like dew upon the field, miracles, it has been thought, are G-d’s works in a human world. The Exodus is full of miracles, in its demonstrations of G-d’s power through the plagues, or G-d’s redemptive force by splitting the sea. (more…)
With six months into my first year as President, I am starting this month’s article with
“Confessions of a Temple President: Part I”:
1. I am a procrastinator when it comes to the bulletin. Even though I get a reminder email about the bulletin deadline, I always wait until the last minute to write a message (just like this one!). (more…)
Click for January 2023 Bulletin. Will open with Adobe Reader or equal.
This month we revisit a stubborn topic that always seems to surface whenever one talks about visiting Israel: how safe is it to go there? Many friends, family, and colleagues remain under the impression that Israel is just a dangerous place due to the constant risk of terrorism. So we are pleased to present a just-published comparative study of the risks posed to visitors across many popular travel destinations. The analysis was conducted by The Swiftest, a San Francisco-based start-up created by experts from the insurance and travel industry to better compare and purchase insurance. These folks focus their data analytics expertise on important societal and environmental issues, and have developed proprietary risk analysis tools to better understand the messages in the data they study. (more…)
Click for December 2022 Bulletin. Will open with Adobe Reader or equal.