Making a Difference

Making a Difference RECIPIENTS OF MOMENT'S COMMUNITY SERVICE AWARDS PART II The essential thing is not study, but mitzvah deeds," said Shimon, the son of Rabban Gamliel, in the Pirke Avot...

...military as a unique expression of pluralism in America and believes that integrating Jewish values into the military will result in a more ethical nation...
...He trained and placed an estimated 1,200 Shoah survivors as rabbis, teachers, mohilim (circumcisors) and shochtim (ritual slaughterers...
...Her staunch stand on women's issues resulted in some nonsexist language in the Reform movement's Gates of Prayer siddur and a special prayer book insert that shows how nonsexist terms can be substituted for sexist ones...
...His numerous articles on interfaith sensitivity and prayer in public settings are models of religious tolerance and pluralism used by all U.S...
...As the Chief of Naval Education and Training, currently stationed in Pensacola, Florida, Resnicoff teaches officers and chaplains of all faiths to examine the moral and ethical questions of military service...
...Resnicoff has concentrated his work in three areas: 1) helping Jews in the military understand and practice Judaism, 2) integrating Jewish values into the military experience and 3) bridging the gap between military and civilian communities...
...Tax-deductible contributions to the Annette Daum Memorial Project can be sent to Lilith Publications, Inc., 250 W. 57th Street, #2432, New York, NY 10107...
...Singer is still involved in advocacy...
...Avital Sharansky, in the early years of her fight for her husband, referred to my home as 'the Singer hotel.'" Notorious to Soviet authorities for her meetings with Jewish activists, Singer was banned from entering the Soviet Union between 1981 and 1988, when she finally returned...
...As soon as I accomplish something, the next minute I say, 'What's next?'" O 'Available at $4.00 from The Coordinating Council on Bikur Cholim of Greater New York, 130 East 59th Street, Room 917, New York, NY 10022...
...She waxes enthusiastic about the joy of being in Israel to meet Natan Sharansky the day after he arrived, of seeing "almost every single person that we worked for find their way to freedom, knowing that perhaps we have helped save a human being...
...She passionately disliked pretense, sham and Jewish organizational grandstanding...
...But Singer cautions, There are still people being refused...
...Night after night at Ben Gurion airport, thousands of Lynn Singer's "children" reach freedom in Israel...
...We face life or death issues of war and the threat of war...
...the acts that allow the needy to help themselves...
...RELIGION "Military people struggle more than civilians with many moral and ethical questions," says Commander Arnold Resnicoff, a rabbi and U.S...
...The LICSJ participates in a direct resettlement of Soviet Jews in the Shar Hanegev area of Israel...
...Annette Daum died of cancer in 1988...
...In subsequent issues moment will introduce awardees in Literature and the Arts and Charitable Fund-raising...
...Remember me...
...Within 48 hours of his interview, he had recommendations from officials at Yeshiva University, the Jewish Theological Seminary and Hebrew Union College...
...rhetorically asks Lyon Singer, executive director of the Long Island Committee for Soviet Jewry (LICSJ) and past national president and current member of the executive committee of the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews...
...Make checks payable to Lilith Publications/Daum Project...
...O The judges for this category were Tamara Handelsman, member, executive committee, UJA/Federation, Washington, D.C...
...She had a formidable command of the sources of Judaism and Christianity," adds Albert Vorspan, director of the Commission on Social Action of Reform Judaism...
...Her work on interfaith relations predated the Catholic church's Vatican II declaration, Nostra Aetate, when Catholicism became more receptive to Judaism and to Jewish-Catholic relations...
...service people each year...
...Following rabbinical school Resnicoff took one Navy assignment because, he says, "I knew of the shortage of rabbis and I felt loyalty to the Navy because my decision to become a rabbi came from my military service...
...The only thing to do for this 20 percent of the world's Jewish population is to get them out...
...SOCIAL SERVICE The Soviet Union is very scary now...
...He fought for kashrut in federation-supported hospitals and camps, the rights of Shabbat observers and a Jewish ambiance in communal institutions...
...He instituted an annual ethics conference at the Naval War College...
...and the acts that strive to perfect the world...
...Bikur cholim [visiting the sick] is not voluntary...
...Should there be a civil war, who's going to get it first...
...military chaplains...
...I was still detained by passport control and was probably followed," Singer recalls, "but the Soviet Jewish leadership openly waited for me at the airport...
...Singer dates her involvement with the movement to help Soviet Jews to June 15, 1970, "when a group of courageous young Jews charged with attempting to hijack a Soviet plane to leave the Soviet Union for Israel were arrested in Leningrad...
...The love and response that I've gotten in return—there's no way to describe it...
...She founded Feminists of Faith, an interfaith feminist project, and served on the advisory board of Lilith, a quarterly Jewish feminist magazine, where she contributed ground-breaking articles on abortion and Jewish law...
...In 1967, Daum was one of the first women elected president of a synagogue...
...Of his chaplains' training he says, "Sometimes I wish that everyone in the clergy could go to that school whether or not they go into the military: For eight weeks priests, rabbis and ministers share and learn together...
...It's a wonderful experience...
...We still have about 600 families of either long-term refuseniks or poor relatives—those whose former spouse or another living relative will not sign permission for them to apply to leave—or those who have been given arbitrary refusals...
...The entire time I was in the military," Resnicoff notes, "I never met a rabbi...
...Naval chaplain...
...We're still agonizing over decisions and actions in past wars, including Vietnam," Resnicoff adds...
...It's a two-way street...
...He decided to remain in the military as a chaplain after his first year of service, but not without some soul-searching about the personal sacrifices the military demands on family life...
...Immediately following World War II until 1950 Trainin directed the religious department of the United Service for New Americans...
...I see very bright, capable young people—our future officers, admirals and generals— struggling with major ethical questions...
...and Thomas Neumann, former executive vice president, B'nai B'rith International...
...At a time when feminist consciousness-raising was in its infancy, Daum crusaded for abortion rights, ran workshops on sexism in Jewish education and wrote articles on antisemitism and the women's movement...
...A year later, in December 1989, the difference was incredible...
...I envisioned the horror of another Holocaust Soviet Jews became my raison d'etre...
...and holds yearly regional conferences...
...Marc Klein, editor and publisher, Northern California •Jewish Bulletin...
...publishes resource guides listing bikur cholim programs in New York and 60 other cities...
...He encouraged cooperation between federation agencies and synagogues in addressing these problems...
...He began leading services and later contacted the Jewish Theological Seminary about their rabbinical program...
...provides free medical advisory services...
...and Rabbi Jack Riemer, rabbi at Beth David Congregation, Miami, Florida...
...Antisemitism is more rife every day...
...Her anti-missionary educational programs became a model for junior high and high school students throughout the country...
...When he was hired, the Federation was seeking someone who would be acceptable to the three religious movements...
...Through Daum's work on Jewish feminist issues, she became involved in interfaith dialogues...
...Trainin estimates that there will be 150 cities included in the third edition bf his resource guide this spring.* Trainin expects to convene a national conference to encourage more communities to establish bikur cholim societies and to join a national bikur cholim network...
...These people are hostages...
...People work hard either because they're altruists or they're insecure...
...He also instigated a campaign for the military to take part in the annual Holocaust National Days of Remembrance, for which he edited "Horror and Hope: Americans Remember the Holocaust" and the Department of Defense observance guide...
...Resnicoffs report on his experience in the aftermath of the 1983 Beirut marine barracks bombing was written at President Reagan's request, and the president read the report before 20,000 members of the "Baptist Fundamentalism 1984" conference...
...We don't have all the answers, but it is amazing that we keep asking the questions...
...Resnicoff regards the U.S...
...Friends and colleagues established the Annette Daum Memorial Project, a nonprofit fund to underwrite articles on intergroup feminist relations for Lilith.' "Annette was a vigorous and totally straightforward person," says Balfour Brickner, rabbi of the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in New York City and the former director of UAHC's Department of Interreligious Affairs...
...More than 30 years ago she began as a volunteer—at her synagogue and in her Long Island community...
...Although he sees some changes, Resnicoff often feels that military chaplains and Jews in the armed forces are ignored by the Jewish community at large...
...You helped me get my first job in '46?'" Trainin minimizes his accomplishments: "After 44 years in Jewish communal life, you just can't retire...
...We [in the military] need support, but we can also give it...
...I founded the Coordinating Council on Bikur Cholim of Greater New York to encourage synagogues to establish bikur cholim committees to visit the sick in hospitals, nursing homes and particularly the homebound...
...it is a religious obligation," counsels Rabbi Isaac Trainin...
...I'm not an altruist...
...See moment, February 1991, for International Community Service Award recipients in the categories of Volunteer Service, Scholarship and Education...
...I don't think there's any organized effort, for example, to get Jews in the military to even contribute to UJA," notes Resnicoff...
...To combat this neglect, he speaks at community centers and synagogues and served as the first military chaplain on the United Jewish Appeal Rabbinic Cabinet...
...Annette was respected by her colleagues in the Protestant and Catholic worlds...
...We're involved day after day in such questions as the use and possible abuse of power...
...Making a Difference RECIPIENTS OF MOMENT'S COMMUNITY SERVICE AWARDS PART II The essential thing is not study, but mitzvah deeds," said Shimon, the son of Rabban Gamliel, in the Pirke Avot (Ethics of Our Fathers) . Mitzvah deeds are acts of kindness, selflessness and charity...
...That day I decided that I could not sit and be quiet...
...Jack Kemp, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, in 1983 called Singer "the 'mother' of the refuseniks...
...Trainin explains that the council acts as a coordinating network: "Not long ago, I got a call from a woman in Palm Springs, California, that she has a very sick grandmother in Miami...
...As the only chaplain in mainland Japan from 1976 to 1979, Resnicoff designed a Jewish chapel in Yokosuka...
...Resnicoff came to the rabbinate after three and a half years of military service, including a year in Vietnam's Mekong Delta...
...She's sick and she's lonely...
...Through the Commission on Synagogue Relations, Trainin launched programs dealing with interfaith marriage, unaffiliated Jews, black Jews, the aged, divorce, chronic gambling, alcohol and drug abuse, medical ethics, poverty, and the role of Jewish women in a changing society...
...His work to help create the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial was acknowledged when Resnicoff was invited to deliver the closing prayer at the memorial's dedication...
...That always pushed me...
...In 1986, when he retired, Trainin "fulfilled a dream...
...In this issue we announce moment's second International Community Service Awards in Social Service to an activist for Soviet Jewry and to an administrator who developed a network for the frail and bedridden, and in Religion to a military chaplain who brings Jewish ethical ideals to officers and enlistees and to a behind-the-scenes initiator who developed model programs in interfaith relations, non-sexist liturgy and anti-missionary education...
...He strives tirelessly to ensure that the religious rights of Jews in the military are protected...
...Eventually Annette Daum rose through the ranks of the Reform movement to become director of both the Department of Interreligious Affairs and the Commission on Social Action of Reform Judaism at the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC...
...From 1982 to 1984, he served the Sixth Fleet as its only chaplain and helped create the Haifa USO in Israel, which now reaches tens of thousands of U.S...
...I would like to prove that Jews in the military can still be a part of the larger Jewish community," says Resnicoff...
...Rabbi Deborah R. Prinz, rabbi at Temple Adat Shalom, Poway, California...
...O The judges for this category were Rabbi Barry Freundel, rabbi at The Georgetown Syna-gogue/Kesher Israel Congregation, Washington, D.C...
...He founded Compatimates, a Jewish marriage bureau, and influenced the federation to establish day care centers, Jewish libraries and singles programs and to increase allocations to yeshivot and day schools...
...Once in a while I still run into someone who says, 'You're Rabbi Trainin...
...I came to this country from Latvia at the age of 12.1 always felt that if I didn't accomplish something, there's something wrong with me...
...But moment is finding them...
...Because of his efforts, Orthodox Jews became more comfortable in the halls of federations...
...Those who perform these mitzvah deeds are often unrecognized—our friends and neighbors, rabbis and teachers, artists and layleaders...
...So we picked up the phone and called the bikur cholim society in Miami, and three hours later the woman called to thank me...
...As director of religious affairs for the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies of New York for 34 years, Trainin, who has Orthodox rabbinic ordination, represented the entire synagogue world to the Federation...
...An Episcopal priest asked him to serve as a Jewish lay leader because at that time there were only four Navy rabbis...
...I was older—an officer, a college graduate—but, I think, for the 18-year-olds it was almost criminal that they never saw a rabbi...
...The council offers training seminars sponsored by the three family agencies of Greater New York—the Jewish Board of Family and Children's Services, the Westchester Jewish Community Services and the Jewish Community Services of Long Island...

Vol. 16 • April 1991 • No. 2


 
Developed by
Kanda Sofware
  Kanda Software, Inc.