Our clergy are Rabbi Clifford E. Librach and Cantor Penny Kessler.
Here are the sermons that Rabbi Librach has given for the High Holy Days of 5766:
Here are the sermons that Rabbi Librach gave for the High Holy Days of 5765:
Our own Rabbi Librach was asked to be one of the two inaugural scholars for a new national on-line learning program of the Union for Reform Judaism (URJ), called Eilu v'Eilu. The topic for the first month was The Significance of the First Amendment Today. Rabbi Joan Glazer Farber, Adult Learning Director of the URJ, said "This point/counterpoint model will involve a dialogue between two scholars, and is the kind of intellectual debate -- new to many Reform Jews -- which is at the very core of our tradition. Cliff is a natural, and a perfect choice to initiate this kind of interactive adult learning. We are beginning with the best."
You can get access to the program from http://www.urj.org/torah/ten/eilu.
You can see the first set of statements at http://urj.org/torah/ten/eilu/v1w1/.
The second week's responses are at http://urj.org/torah/ten/eilu/v1w2/.
Rabbi Librach and Rabbi Saperstein's responses to reader questions are at http://urj.org/torah/ten/eilu/v1w3/.
Rabbi Librach's concluding essay is at http://urj.org/torah/ten/eilu/v1w5/.
Rabbi Saperstein's concluding essay is at http://urj.org/torah/ten/eilu/v1w6/.
In June 2007, after a New York Times article brought to light the controversially anti-Semitic implications in Handel's "Hallelujah Chorus" from "The Messiah," the UJC's Cantor Kessler and Cantor Roz Barak of San Francisco were invited to participate in the Eilu v'Eilu project, the first Cantors to do so. They were asked to discuss "Difficult Musical Texts - From a Cantor's Vantage Point, From a Child's Vantage Point."
As the URJ site puts it:
A recent controversy involving the lyrics of Handel's "Hallelujah Chorus" from The Messiah, one of the most beloved pieces of Western music, traveled from the halls of academia to prominent mention in The New York Times. Do the words of this masterpiece "convey malice toward Judaism," (James B. Oestreich, "Hallelujah Indeed: Debating Handel's Anti-Semitism," The New York Times, Monday, April 23, 2007, E3), sending implicit cues that Handel was an anti-Semite? How should the Jewish community respond to the music of well known anti-Semites like Richard Wagner? -- Almost all of us who attended a public school remember with some discomfort singing Christmas carols containing words that deify Jesus. How did we deal with this problem then? What directives might me give to our children, nieces, nephews and grandchildren today?
You can get access to the program from http://www.urj.org/torah/ten/eilu.
You can see the first set of statements at http://urj.org/torah/ten/eilu/v16w1/.
The second week's responses are at http://urj.org/torah/ten/eilu/v16w2/.
Cantor Kessler's and Cantor Barak's responses to reader questions are at http://urj.org/torah/ten/eilu/v16w3/.
Cantor Kessler's and Cantor Barak's concluding essays are at http://urj.org/torah/ten/eilu/v16w4/.