Saturday, May 14th, 2022, 7:00 PM – 9:00 PM. In-person. An exploration of the lives and music of celebrated Jewish songwriters, whose achievements would come to dominate that body of work known as the “Great American Songbook.” We’ll discuss the lives, careers, and music of such luminaries as the Brothers Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Irving Berlin, Harold Arlen, and more. Live performances from Seth Kibel will make this program as exciting as the music itself.
Monday, May 9, 2022, 6:30 – 7:30 PM. Online. Step back in time with a tour of the Tenement Museum on New York’s Lower East Side. Learn the story of the Rogarschevsky family, a Lithuanian Jewish family who lived in the Museum’s building in the early 1910s. This is the final event in this year’s Book Club, which focused on the Jewish immigrant experience in New York City’s Lower East Side.
Saturday, May 7th, 12:00 – 1:00 PM. In-person. Michael Stein traveled as a volunteer to Auschwitz-Birkenau to gather evidence to be used in a trial to discredit Holocaust deniers. Mike will describe his trip, what he found, and what resulted from his participation.
We learned the difference between “whiskey” (used in the US and Ireland) and “whisky” (used in Canada and Scotland) as 21 of us joined Brett Drucker on Sunday, April 24th to gain some knowledge about whisk(e)y and taste a bourbon, a rye, a malted scotch, and a peated scotch. It was a great inauguration of the bar cart donated by Jeanne and John Howard (see it going forward after Shabbat services).
Sunday, May 1, 10:30 AM. Online. Yom Ha’Shoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) falls on April 28, 2022. The full name of the day commemorating the victims of the Holocaust is “Yom Ha’Shoah Ve-Hagevurah”— literally the “Day of (Remembrance of) the Holocaust and the Heroism.” Our students are fortunate to still have the opportunity to hear stories of survival directly from Holocaust survivors. This year we have two opportunities for them to participate. The second testimony will be given by Peter Gorog, who was born in Budapest, Hungary, in 1941. He survived the Budapest ghetto. This session will be attended by 5th through 7th graders in the Religious School, but all are welcome.
Sunday, May 1, 2022, 3:30 PM. In-person. Agudas Achim Congregation, 2908 Valley Drive, Alexandria, VA. A musical tribute to long-time CEH member Flory Jagoda, the “flame-keeper of Sephardic music.” $18/person ($20 at the door), $36/family. All tickets will include a link to a rebroadcast of the concert that can be viewed anytime between May 19 and June 2.
Last Sunday, we welcomed soferet Alexandra Casser into our Sanctuary where we joined her in the process of writing a Sefer Torah. It was a blast! “Thank you all for your generosity and for making Sunday’s event a great success! For those of you who were able to come in person, I hope you enjoyed the experience of helping to repair our Torah while learning a bit about the process from our Soferet. It was great seeing so many of you there.” -Dan Rosman, VP of Fundraising
Sunday, May 1, 9:30 AM – 12:30 PM. In-person. A Sefer Torah is delicate and precious. While we take care of it well, sometimes we need to fix a letter here and there. This is an opportunity to fulfill the Mitzvah (commandment) of writing a Sefer Torah, by writing one letter with a soferet (Torah scribe). We want to invite you and your family to this unique opportunity to help our community and engage in the experience of writing a Sefer Torah. Each family will have a dedicated time slot with the soferet to help her fix one letter.
Tuesday, April 26, 7:00 PM. Online. Yom Ha’Shoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) falls on April 28, 2022. The full name of the day commemorating the victims of the Holocaust is “Yom Ha’Shoah Ve-Hagevurah”— literally the “Day of (Remembrance of) the Holocaust and the Heroism.” Our students are fortunate to still have the opportunity to hear stories of survival directly from Holocaust survivors. This year we have two opportunities for them to participate. The first testimony will be given by Ruth Cohen, who was born in Mukacevo, Czechoslovakia, in 1930. She is a survivor of Auschwitz and other camps. This session will be attended by 8th and 9th graders in the Religious School, but all are welcome.
On April 24, Kitah Hey – Kitah Zayin students (5th – 7th Grades) learned about the mitzvah of tefillin. Rav Natan taught them about the values of coherency (alignment of actions, emotions and thoughts), tradition, and divine partnership. Morah CJ, Morah Amanda and Moreh Jacob led discussions and games to help the students learn and share their thoughts. Students also built jumbo tefillin and then learned to wrap their own. Yasher Koach to all!
