LRS Newlsetter No. 4; April 2, 2007

Louis Rose Society Newsletter No. 4                            Monday, April 2, 2007

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In this issue:

Rabbi Michael Berk to lead CBI                    Jewish Community Calendar
Jewish Grapevine (News, Views Jews)         Jewish internet humor
Jewish history video link                                How you can help
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Since last September when Rabbi Paul Citrin served notice that he planned to retire as senior rabbi of Congregation Beth Israel, a process has been in place to choose his successor—with the final step expected Thursday, April 12, when Rabbi Michael Berk's selection
Rabbi Berk

goes before the congregational membership for approval.

According to Tidings, the newsletter of Congregation Beth Israel, 19 candidates were interviewed by telephone with five invited to visit Beth Israel to meet with the search committee, teach a class, lead a worship service and deliver a sermon or d'var Torah.

Sanford Feldman, MD, who co-chaired the search committee with Barbara Haworth, said the process took hundred of hours of volunteer work by committee members Bob Fiderman, Nadine Finkel, Cynthia Fram, Dr. Russ Gold, Gladie Jaffe, Emily Jennewein, Dr. Jerry Levy, Dr. Barbara Lounsbury, Steve Ritter and Cynthia Wexler.

Rabbi Berk, 54, "is, in a word, a mensch," Feldman said. He had served Temple Beth Torah in Ventura, Calif., for six years before accepting an appointment as the regional director of the Pacific Central West Council of the Union of Reform Judaism.

"Rabbi Berk is described as a man of integrity and high moral and religious standards," Feldman reported. "Those who have been served by him or have worked with him say he is kind to and respectful of others. He listens. He is approachable. He addresses conflict with patience and not with anger. He is described as a team builder who makes everyone feel at ease. We are told that he is quick to give credit to others for their work and humble about taking anycredit for his own."

Berk's wife is Rabbi Aliza Berk, who was ordained the same day as he was in June 1890. She now serves as a rabbi at the Bay Area Jewish Healing Center. Their daughter, Jenna Moxon, 22, is married to Andy, now serving in Iraq. The rabbis' son, Jonathan, is a student at City College of Santa Barbara. A brother, Rabbi William Berk, is the emeritus rabbi of Temple Chai of Phoenix, Az.

Conductor Nuvi Mehta to lead discussion
about film on music in the death camps

SAN DIEGO (Publicity Release)—Christopher Nupen’s award-winning film We Want the Light (DVD version) about freedom, survival and the extraordinary place of music in the Nazi concentration camps kicks off the 8^th Annual San Diego Jewish Music Festival, sponsored by the Private Bank of Bank of America and presented by the San Diego Center for Jewish Culture. We Want the Light, in two parts, will run April 18 (Part I) and April 19 (Part II), at 7:30 p.m. at the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center, JACOBS FAMILY CAMPUS. Tickets are free, but reservations are required. A post film discussion with conductor Nuvi Mehta follows the screenings.

This powerful documentary features stunning musical contributions from Pinchas Zuckerman, Itzhak Perlman, Evgeny Kissin, Daniel Barenboim, and Zubin Mehta, with The Gürzenich Orchestra of Cologne, The Cologne Opera Chorus, and The Cologne Cathedral Children’s Choir conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazy, playing music by Mahler, Bach, Schoenberg, Bruch, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Wagner, Schubert, Bloch, Brahms, and Waxman.

The title of the film, We Want the Light, is taken from a poem by a 12-year-old girl written in the Theresienstadt concentration camp. Her words provide both the title and the climax of the film – in a setting for two choruses and orchestra by the American composer Franz Waxman, in his work, The Song of Terezin.

The documentary is about many things. It is about freedom and captivity, about emancipation, acculturation and assimilation; it is about the roles played by Moses and Felix Mendelssohn in the dream of fruitful, unproblematic integration of the Jews into German society after their liberation from the ghettos; it is about Richard Wagner, his ferociously anti-Semitic essay Das Judenthum in der Musik (The Jews in Music) and his influence on the thinking of the Third Reich; but, most of all, it is a film about how much music can mean to people, even in the direst of circumstances. Three inspiring Holocaust survivors, Anita Lasker-Wallfisch, Jacques Stroumsa, and Alice Sommer Herz share their quiet dignity and courage in the face of appalling suffering.

A discussion led by Nuvi Mehta will follow the screenings. Mehta is Artistic Director of the Ventura Music Festival, Music Director of the Marquette Symphony, and Music Director of the Nova Vista Symphony (Sunnyvale, CA). Mehta is also the Director for Outreach Programs for the San Diego Chamber Orchestra and a regular guest of the San Diego Symphony outreach program.

The Jewish Grapevine (or News, Views, Jews!)

The Samuel and Rebecca Astor Judaica Library at the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center has received "advanced accreditation" for three years in recognition of its special exhibits and projects.

Zev and Shoshana Bar-Lev is kvelling over the birth of a grandson. The family will reveal his name at the brit milah to be conducted at 8:30 a.m. Thursday at Tifereth Israel Synagogue. ...

Jeremy Ehrlich, 21, a senior majoring in International Security & Conflict Resolution and minoring in Spanish, has been elected Associated Students Vice President of External Affairs at San Diego State University. He is a former president of the Sigma Alpha Mu fraternity. In the recently concluded campaign for student offices, Ehrlich called for a program to help students find affordable housing, and to expand the campus Community Service Center. He intends to attend law school.

Rabbi Yeruchem Eilfort of Chabad of La Costa has been named editor of a startup quarterly news magazine, Impact, to serve all 143 Chabad institutions on the West Coast. The rabbi also has his own radio show, "To Life, LeChaim." on KCBQ 1170am Sundays evenings from 8 – 9 p.m.

Cantor Sheldon Merel, emeritus cantor of Congregation Beth Israel, will be back on the bima Friday, May 18, to celebrate his second bar mitzvah, a tradition on a person's 83rd birthday. This is because "three score and ten" or 70 years was considered a normal life span, so at 83, Merel is 13 years into his second life. And we all know what a Jew does on the 13th birthday!

Arlette Smith's visit to Israel, where her daughter Julie (now Lilit Smeet) serves as a lone soldier, recently was featured in Tidings, the newsletter of Congregation Beth Israel. Arlette's husband and Julie's dad is Greg Smith, the tax assessor, recorder and clerk of San Diego County. Her brother Harrison Smith is a student a San Diego Jewish Academy. Among Arlette's numerous community activities, she serves as the secretary of the Louis Rose Society for the Preservation of Jewish History. Click here or on the photo for an enlarged version of the article.

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Jewish History Video Link
Hillel Mazansky forwards to us from Bernardo Romanowsky a short video detailing some of the history of our Jewish people, with a focus on Jerusalem. Click here to see it.

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How you can help assure a daily Jewish community news voice...

Our online San Diego newsletter for the Jewish community is gaining steam with various writers signing up to share their columns with you. You can help this volunteer effort in many ways such as sending your stories or ideas to us at sdheritage@cox.net. If you would like to be one of our volunteer writers, webmasters, editors, advertising sales persons, or help us in any other capacity as we try to restore an ongoing Jewish voice to San Diego, please call Donald H. Harrison at (619) 265-0808. Your contributions will be welcomed.
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:-) Jewish Internet Humor :-)