Welcoming Pastor Mike McBride, Speaking on Reparations and Teshuvah, on Erev Rosh Hashana
Rabbi Dev Noily, with Hazzan Shulamit Wise Fairman We feel very honored to be welcoming Pastor Mike McBride as our guest teacher for Erev Rosh Hashana. Pastor Mike is an Oakland-based national leader in the movement for racial justice. It’s unusual for us to have a guest from outside our community offering a drash / […]
Hiring a Part-Time POC (People of Color) Organizer as the Next Step in Kehilla’s Belonging and Allyship: Racial Justice Initiative!
Rabbi Dev Noily Maybe you’ve seen our recent postings, looking to hire a ¼-time organizer to work with Kehilla’s POC affinity groups. I’m excited to share a little background about our Belonging and Allyship: Racial Justice Initiative, about how this position came to life, and about our hopes for the coming year and beyond. This […]
Mourning the Attack on Chabad of Poway – Coming Together this Friday
Dear Friends, Our hearts are heavy with the news of yet another white supremacist shooting in a place of worship – this time at Chabad of Poway, near San Diego, on Shabbat morning, the 8th day of Pesach, where many people had come for Yizkor, memorial prayers that are recited four times a year. Coming […]
Sharing our Process in Responding to the New Zealand Mosque Shootings
by Rabbi Dev Noily On March 15, we learned of the horrible attack against people praying in Masjid Al Noor and the Linwood Masjid in New Zealand. We continue to mourn and to build our relationships with local Muslim communities in the wake of the attack. Sometime later I was talking with Kehilla’s board co-chair, […]
Why I support the Women’s March
I think it’s important for Jews to stay with the Women’s March, and to address the anti-semitism that surfaces there as a natural and expected part of working in broad coalitions. Black and brown women also have to address the white supremacy that surfaces, Muslim women have to address the Islamophobia that surfaces, trans women […]
Seeing the Dark in a Different Light
by Rabbi Dev Noily Hanukkah invites us to explore the holy possibilities of darkness. Our practice of Hanukkah can radically challenge our society’s privileging of light over darkness – a privileging that perpetuates, and may be rooted in, our structural racism. We can see this in our language—both what we say and what we hear. […]
Coming Together in the Shadow of the Tree of Life
By Rabbi Dev Noily We are shaken and grieving, each of us in our own ways, all of us together. We know more now about the people whose lives have been lost and shattered. We know more about the three Jewish communities who shared a building – Tree of Life, Dor Hadash and New Light. […]
An Update to Kehilla’s Process For Responding to Abuse
by Rabbi Dev Noily Keeping our community one that is safe for everyone, and where people facing abuse can find support, is a priority for Kehilla. Our Board recently reviewed and revised our policy for responding to abuse. The purpose of this article is to share some of Kehilla’s history around responding to abuse, and […]
Thank You to the People Who Make Our High Holy Days Come to Life!
by Rabbi Dev Noily I’m about to take down our sukkah, excited that rain is miraculously in the forecast. All that lulav-shaking inviting an early drizzle to our parched soil in these early days of what we pray will be a season of rain. I feel the fullness of this time of year, a kind […]
The Full Guide to Counting the Omer
Click here for a PDF version of the booklet Sefirat Ha’Omer
