Why the Mourner’s Kaddish Isn’t Broken in Reform Judaism
Is Kaddish broken in Reform Judaism? Or do our diverse Kaddish practices indicate a movement willing to embrace all who are in need?
S’lichot ‘Round Midnight
What is the appropriate way to conceive of midnight for Reform Jewish religious purposes? Halachic? Secular? Or a little bit of both?
Long As God Can Grow It
Is that a mop on your head or are you just counting the Omer? Or how I ended up observing the Omer in spite of myself.
Omer Is My Siddur? (Alone on a Shelf)
Using Judaism’s traditional seven-week period of mourning as inspiration to return to a ‘three-a-day the Jewish way’ prayer practice.
The Amidah Project: Three a Day the RJ Way
A reader asked how a Reform Jew can learn to pray Judaism’s traditional three weekday prayers. Here’s my guide on using Mishkan T’filah, the current RJ prayerbook, to do just that.
The Amidah Project: Modeh Ani (Video)
The Modeh Ani: prayer upon waking or jaunty country song? It’s how I greet the world every morning, thanking God for the gift of another day. But I’m never able to get a certain Kol B’Seder melody out of my head. And that’s okay. Gratitude is never something to be embarrassed about.
The Amidah Project: Laying Tefillin–Wearing Your Prayer on Your Sleeve (Video)
Phylacteries. Except, no Jew calls them that. They’re tefillin, and Jews are commanded to wrap themselves in them before morning prayer. They’re a part of my morning ritual. Here’s what that looks like.
The Amidah Project: Kol Nidre
To experience the t’shuvah of Kol Nidre, who really cares about the legal basis for Judaism’s most famous High Holy Day chant?
Once Around the Sanctuary, Not So Fast
People often remark that converts tend to have a deeper knowledge of Judaism than do Jews by birth. But as with all things, practice makes perfect.
Amidah Project: Everything Is Holy
I find it hard to look at human suffering and see no-suffering. I find it hard to look at human faces and see no-faces. It’s not that, deep down, I feel we have any independent existence from God. It’s that I think we’re not supposed to see it that way.