YCT Launches LGBTQ+ Community Initiatives and Welcomes Its First Director
YCT is pleased to announce the launch of its LGBTQ+ Community Initiatives and the hiring of David Pernick as Director of the Initiatives. The LGBTQ+ Community Initiatives project seeks to help create a culture of true inclusion in Orthodox communities for our LGBTQ+ members. The need for such a project...
Read more >Synagogue Teshuva
By Rabbi Jonathan Leener for eJewishPhilanthropy For many American Jews, the synagogue is totally irrelevant. As an institution, the synagogue is often viewed as being sterile and unwelcoming. Authenticity and inclusivity are not often associated with synagogue life. Membership decline and building closures are now commonplace. We could use COVID-19...
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Jewish Journal- Rabbis of LA | Rabbi Aaron Finkelstein: The Educator With a Pastoral Focus
Kylie Ora Lobell One day, a shepherd was tending his flock, and he became thirsty. As he was drinking, he saw something simple that would change his life forever. There were small drops of water hitting a large rock, and a deep indentation in the stone where the water fell. ...
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#YCTInnovators: Kyle Savitch (’21) Is Helping Lead the Growing Orthodox Community of Harlem
Kyle Savitch (’21), far right, learning and teaching Torah in Harlem. Kyle Savitch graduated from YCT in May 2021. Now, he is directing his energies full-time toward Kehillat Harlem, his grassroots Jewish community, where he serves as the rabbi. He will be helping build the Harlem Jewish community thanks to...
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I’m a Rabbi With Mental Illness and I’m Done Trying to Hide My Pain
By Rabbi Avram Mlotek (’15), for Alma. Content warning: suicidal ideation I live with bipolar disorder and major depressive disorder. As a rabbi, cantor, actor and author, that’s not how I usually introduce myself. But this summer I spent three and a half weeks at an in-patient facility tending to...
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Jewish Daily Forward: A Chicago Orthodox rabbi reaches out to his Rohingya and Black neighbors
By Joshua Flanders Read the original story in the Jewish Daily Forward here. In Chicago’s large Orthodox Jewish community, Rabbi Ari Hart stands out. As a leader at Skokie Valley Agudath Jacob Synagogue in Skokie, Illinois, Hart focuses on the roles of women within their community, inclusion of LGBTQ individuals,...
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Why Being a Rabbi Led Me to Participate in the Novavax Vaccine Trial
By Rabbi Uri Topolosky (’05), for Washington Jewish Week For two years in a row, our congregation has concluded Yom Kippur under the stars — this past year due to COVID, and the year before after a 3-year-old boy pulled the fire alarm with 20 minutes left in Neilah. Both...
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#YCTInnovators: Learn about Rabbi Scott Kalmikoff’s (’18) Journey to Professional Genealogy
Interview with Rabbi Scott Kalmikoff (’18) Rabbi Scott Kalmikoff (’18) is a professional genealogist and Global Connections Education Associate at the Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest NJ. How did you first become interested in genealogy? I was about 15 years old when I first became interested in genealogy. I was...
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In Haifa Coronavirus Ward, a US-Trained Rabbi Helps Muslims Keep the Faith
Interview with Rabbi Mike Schultz (’08) by Nathan Jeffay in The Times of Israel As Israel’s third wave COVID cases surge, Rabbi Mike Schultz dons his hazmat suit, and prepares to talk about Allah. Israel’s Arab citizens have been disproportionately hit by the coronavirus pandemic, which means that 12 years...
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Open Doors
By Rabbi Avram Mlotek for Tablet Magazine His door was unlocked. Two weeks prior, a man took advantage of this basic act of radical kindness when Grafton Thomas burst through Rabbi Chaim Rottenberg’s home in Monsey, N.Y., slashing at people with an 18-inch machete, leaving one man in critical condition....
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