It was a year ago this weekend that Unity Baptist Church in Braddock held its last in-person Sunday worship service before widespread shutdowns began due to the spreading COVID-19 pandemic.

Its members still haven’t been back together in person.

Source:...

(JTA) – To prepare for Passover, Sam Greene is deep-cleaning his dorm room in keeping with the standards of his Orthodox Jewish family.

Lena Ben-Gideon is compiling readings about immigration to supplement her haggadah.

And Juliana Sherer is casting her friends in a dramatic performance of “Had Gadya,” the song that plays a prominent role in her family’s Seders.

In a typical year, the three Brandeis University students would be heading home to spend Passover with their families in Cleveland,...

Out of grief and sheer frustration due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Rev. Karie Charlton of Third Presbyterian Church in Shadyside admitted that she cried herself to sleep at several points throughout the past year.

In sharing her story of grief and vulnerability, Rev. Charlton said she hopes others may feel inspired to make themselves vulnerable to their loved ones as well during such a difficult time.

Source:...

The lone synagogue in Walla Walla, Washington, is housed in a repurposed convenience store and run by volunteers. The synagogue, Cong. Beth Israel, has never provided the array of programs available at those in larger cities, but for decades it’s been the only Jewish institution serving a vast swath of the state and parts of neighboring ones.

“We’ll get people from two hours away who say, ‘Hey I’m Jewish but I’m kind of disconnected because I’m out here in rural Oregon,’” said Evan Heisman, the synagogue’s board secretary.

Source:...

Inundated with messages from staff and community members on proposed changes to the 2021-22 calendar, Fairfax County School Board members directed Superintendent Scott Brabrand to redraft it.

During a work session on Tuesday (Mar. 2), the board told staff to consider ways to add flexibility through floating holidays. They said the calendar...

Most mortals have lost track of time as the pandemic spills into year two. But God — assume for the purposes of this article there is one, all-knowing, all-seeing, all-everything — loses track of nothing and nobody, including the generation of Jewish children who, during the time of covid, turned 13.

D. Anthony Alvarez ’21, a member of the Harvard Latter-day Saints Student Association, has attended religious services at the same congregation off campus since he arrived at Harvard as a freshman.

This semester, Alvarez said he still attends services at that same congregation. Amid Covid-19, though, he must sign up to attend ahead of time, don a mask, and eschew singing, which can spread infectious particles.

Source:...

FRAMINGHAM – Over the past year, countless organizations have had to take a step back and think of new and innovative ways to operate during the coronavirus pandemic. Religious institutions have been no exception.

Despite the roadblocks and restrictions brought on by COVID, many religious institutions have actually found great success in navigating the technological world and allowing people to continue to practice their faith in new, COVID-friendly ways.

Source:...

Spokane Police confirmed Monday morning that swastikas were spray painted on the front of the Temple Beth Shalom building.

This isn’t the first time the synagogue has been vandalized. Swastikas were spray painted on the building in 2014 during the High Holy Days.

Source:...

Two national religious groups, one evangelical Christian, the other Orthodox Jewish, have teamed up to offer their sacred spaces for vaccine distribution, hoping to assist government officials and private companies in the effort to combat the ongoing pandemic.

In a recent editorial, Walter Kim, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, and Rabbi Moshe Hauer, executive vice president of the Orthodox Union, made their pitch to help “anyone in need of vaccination, whether or not they are members of our congregations or of our neighborhoods.”

Source:...

At a Jeiwsh Democratic Council of America virtual election celebration on January 17th, newly elected Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock reminded the audience about “the longstanding relationship between the African American community and the Jewish community, our shared values, our sense of justice and struggle for peace in the world,” citing the connection between Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who had once been a pastor at the Atlanta church where Warnock now presides, and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. His fellow Georgia senator-elect, Jon Ossoff, offered a similar...

Not since Cleavon Little and Gene Wilder teamed up to save Rock Ridge from the bad guys in Mel Brooks’ “Blazing Saddles" half a century ago has there been a Black-Jewish buddy story like Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff’s joint runoff campaign in Georgia.

It’s about a Black Baptist preacher and the young Jewish go-getter the preacher calls “my brother from another mother” who, in a scenario that rivals any in American political history, have the eyes of the nation on them as they seek to oust two Republican incumbent senators and give control of Capitol Hill to the Democrats....

A white supremacist group from New Jersey posted more than a dozen anti-Semitic flyers on Staten Island.

The flyers, found over the weekend in the New York City borough, are emblazoned with a Jewish star and falsely claim that Antifa, the loose anti-fascist network, is a Jewish organization that is anti-white.

Source: ...

“There’s a perception out there — and for good reason — that the Orthodox community is monolithic,” said Sasha Kesler, who identifies herself as a Modern Orthodox Jew. “And becoming increasingly conservative. But it’s not.”

“I know what I know about my community,” continued Kesler, who lives in Riverdale, New York, and attends the Hebrew Institute, one of the major synagogues in the Bronx neighborhood. “My friends, the rabbis, the leaders: We are progressives. We look to the Torah and the texts we have to teach us the lessons of our obligation to care for others.”

...

Jewish tradition teaches that the story of the Hanukkah miracle of light over darkness should be publicized.

It’s the reason some Jews put a menorah (sometimes called a “hanukkiah”) in the window or by the door. Lighting the nine-branched candelabrum is the central ritual of the eight-day holiday, which begins Thursday (Dec. 10).

But for the most part, American Jews have kept the December holiday an indoor celebration among family and friends. Unlike the High Holy Days of Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur when Jews crowd synagogues en masse, Hanukkah has always been a...