TEMPLE SINAI BULLETINFebruary 2019 / Sh’vat-Adar 5779 Vol. 91 No. 2 Our Mishkan T’filah Prayer Book Sisterhood Spring Event Schedule Spring Book Discussion Ten Years Later 1 SERVICES FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 1 6:15 p.m. Shabbat Services with The Band and Anniversary/Birthday Blessings Babysitting Available SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 2 9:00 a.m. Torah Study and Shabbat Services Torah Portion: Mishpatim, Exodus 21:1−24:18 FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 8 6:15 p.m. Shabbat Services SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 9 9:00 a.m. Torah Study & Shabbat Services FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 15 6:15 p.m. Shabbat Services SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 16 9:00 a.m. Torah Study & Shabbat Services Torah Portion: T’tzaveh, Exodus 27:20−30:10 FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 22 6:15 p.m. Shabbat Services with Soprano Performance of “Five Hebrew Love Songs” by Shira Kaplan and Accompanists SAVE THE DATE SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 23 Mardi Gras - Office Closed 9:00 a.m. Torah Study & Shabbat Services Tuesday, March 5 Torah Portion: Ki Tisa, Exodus 30:11−34:35 Sisterhood Pesach Matzo Ball Roll FRIDAY, MARCH 1 Sunday, March 10 5:00 p.m. Shabbat Services with The Band Brotherhood Lunch with Rabbi Reimer and Anniversary/Birthday Blessings Wednesday, March 13 | 12:30 p.m. Babysitting Available Temple Sinai Spring Gala SATURDAY, MARCH 2 Saturday, March 16 | 7:15 p.m. 9:00 a.m. Torah Study & Shabbat Services Sisterhood Meeting Torah Portion: Vayak’heil, Exodus 35:1–38:20 Sunday, March 24 | 10:00 a.m. Jewish Endowment Foundation Dinner Don’t miss your chance to advertise your Honoring Sandy Levy business or leave a message to Cantor Colman Thursday, March 28 | 6:00 p.m. in our 2019 gala tribute book! Sisterhood Senior Outreach Luncheon Send your form to 6227 St. Charles Ave., NOLA Wednesday, April 3 70118 or Liz Yager at [email protected] by Wednesday, February 27. Brotherhood Seafood Bingo Saturday, May 18 2 RABBI’S MESSAGE Mishkan T’filah – Ten Years Later Rabbi Matthew A. Reimer siddur (prayer book) is a reflection. It is used to reflect The editors of Mishkan T’filah also included rubric head- a particular set of values, a people’s unique history, and ings on the outside margins, indicating the worshipper’s Aan understanding of the past, present and future. current place within the service. I am sure we can all recall The Reform Movement, throughout its history, has published a time when we found ourselves flipping the pages of the many siddurim, each a reflection of the times. The Movement’s siddur forward and backward trying to find our place. This latest reflection, Mishkan T’filah, is celebrating its tenth anniver- new layout helps keep the worshipper grounded. sary and continues in that tradition. Mishkan T’filah is a more Lastly, you will notice that on many of the pages there experiential siddur than previous editions. The editors of our is a significant amount of empty space. These white spaces “new” siddur want its worshippers to engage in the prayers, allow the worshipper to move his/her eyes over the page not simply read and respond to them. Comparing a page from without feeling overwhelmed. Perhaps we want to add our the Movement’s last prayer book, Gates of Prayer, one will see a own words, our own thoughts and our own hopes to the number of differences. prayer that has been set down in print. Mishkan T’filah Rabbi Lawrence Hoffman, Professor of Liturgy, Worship and gives each worshipper a chance to “write” their own prayers Ritual at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, throughout the worship service. explains that “in addition to adding a second color (blue), each The new layout of Mishkan T’filah is a reflection of who page has been uniquely designed.” First and foremost, each we are, both as a congregation and as individuals. We come prayer within Mishkan T’filah is set as a two-page spread. The together to worship as a community, but we each pray dif- two-page spreads are intended so that only one prayer per page ferently. Happy anniversary to our “new” siddur, one that spread is read, either in Hebrew or English. The keva (primary, embraces these differences. I hope you will, too. traditional text) liturgy appears on the right-hand page, while the kavanah (alternative prayer choices) are on the left-hand side. The right-hand page includes the translation and trans- literation of each prayer. In previous versions, transliterations were either at the back of the siddur or left out entirely. Temple Sinai’s worshippers join together for worship services, and we each come with varied bases of knowledge. Now, because of this new layout, we can all worship, literally, on the same page. In addition to our various levels of Hebrew knowledge, we each come to worship with different experiences and relation- ships to God and the prayers themselves. The alternative prayer choices are meant to speak to those differences. They give us the room to “wander” around the page in the hopes that we might learn something new about the prayer, and, in turn, something new about ourselves. You will also notice a notes area at the bottom of many pages. These spiritual commentaries, notes on rabbinic practices, and source citations are another way to reach out to the worship- er. Knowing, for example, that Kabbalat Shabbat, the beautiful prayers we sing to begin our Shabbat services, is a group of six Psalms, representing the six days of creation, can give the wor- shiper a greater sense of meaning adding to his/her worship experience. 3 SINAI HAPPENINGS 1 1 432 35 4 5 Above: (1) Dr. Jason Gaines, visiting professor in the Jewish Studies department at Tulane University, speaks at Saturday Torah study; (2) B’not mitzvah Judy Schwartzer and Janine Rice receive their tallitot; (3-4) Children playing at our Temple Toddlers New Year’s Countdown; (5) Ninth graders chat with Jeffrey Seller, winner of four Tony awards and producer of Rent, Avenue 4 Q, In the Heights, and Hamilton; the class is learning about Jewish influence in Broadway musicals. PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE Your Temple Sinai Brotherhood continues to hold re- peat meetings to help more men attend. Be it weeknights or weekend mornings that fit your schedule, we want you to have every opportunity to get involved. Look for future meeting times in the weekly email blast. Be on the lookout for the date of our next Brotherhood Judge Robin M. Giarrusso social! Thank you to David Tucker for coordinating. Past socials have taken place at Port Orleans Brewing and NOLA January was another busy month at Temple Sinai. Our Brewing Co. Celebration of Peace Weekend--a celebration of Martin Luther Our next clergy lunch is with Rabbi Reimer on March 13. King, Jr. Day with the Muslim community--was a fun and Stay tuned for details! A special thanks to Dr. Alan Sheen meaningful experience, with a prayer luncheon, joint services, for arranging our lunches. and an interfaith walking party in the Martin Luther King’s Day If you have made the decision to be an active member parade. of Brotherhood, wonderful! If you are sitting on the side- Your rabbi search committee has been working overtime lines, please join us! As you can see, there is a great deal to find a new rabbi for Temple Sinai. Should you have any happening with Brotherhood. Currently, we are planning questions or suggestions about the process, please feel free to for Brotherhood Seafood Bingo (May 18) and Brotherhood reach out to me at [email protected]. Shabbat, so come get involved. Please mark your calendars for a our annual spring gala There is more on the horizon, including efforts with on Saturday, March 16! This year, we will honor our beloved the ADL, further involvement with Chavurah@Sinai, and Cantor Colman, as 2019 marks his 20th anniversary of serving much more. The next great idea could be yours! and singing at Temple Sinai. A big thank you to the gala chairs Susan Kierr and her daughter Sarah Hess for all of their hard work, dedication and creativity. I am particularly grateful that SISTERHOOD last year’s chair, Susan Hess, has agreed to serve as the chair emeritus. Her organizational skills and suggestions have been Sharon Kirkpatrick and Verdie Richburg invaluable to the committee. Now that the first month of 2019 is behind us, we hope This morning, before I wrote this bulletin article, I stopped that at the top of your to do list is to join Sisterhood and by the temple to visit with our executive director Liz Yager. As become an active member! There is still time to join and help I was walking into the office, I couldn’t help but notice all the us plan fun events. As two recent past Sisterhood presidents people at Sinai. Liz had successfully rented our social hall for have said, “Temple Sinai Sisterhood members are the cogs another film production! In fact, our auditorium was rented in the wheel of Temple Sinai and we want to make certain out for four days that week for the film crew and an addiction the wheels never stop!” recovery conference. We have plenty of room during the week Sisterhood held its annual Shabbat on January 26. We and a great location. A big thanks to Liz for organizing another thank our coordinators Bonnie Aronson, Doris Baron and way to use our building. Marian Moore, as well as all members who gave readings and served up their favorite dishes at the luncheon.