local
A Year in Review:
2022 Stories to Remember
Sasha Rogelberg | Staff Writer
A s Jews, we’re lucky enough to
have at least two New Years.

While we marked the begin-
ning of Tishrei in September with
apples and honey, hoping for sweetness
and renewed spirituality, celebrating
the secular New Year feels diff erent:
Joined by folks from around the world,
we celebrate Jan. 1 with a midnight
toast and perhaps a collective sigh of
exhaustion or relief that we survived
another year.

2022 has had no shortage of head-
lines, for better or for worse. For our last
issue of the year, the Jewish Exponent
is refl ecting on some of the biggest
moments from the past 12 months.

Female Rabbis at 50:
Challenges Remain
January marked the 50-year anniver-
sary of the ordination of Rabbi Sally
Priesand, the fi rst publicly ordained
woman rabbi in the United States. Fift y
years later, Philadelphia-area women
rabbis refl ect on the progress that’s
been made in accepting and celebrat-
ing women in the rabbinate.

While these rabbis have made a name
for themselves in their communities
and seen other women become rabbis,
they still sometimes receive misogynis-
tic comments from congregants.

“We’ve come so far, and we still have
so far to go,” said Rabbi Alanna Sklover
of Or Hadash: A Reconstructionist
Congregation in Fort Washington.

Leaders Ask ‘What Makes
Community Secure?’
Th ough the hostage crisis in Colleyville,
Texas, took place in January, conversa-
tions around security in Jewish spaces
continued for months.

In response, Jewish leaders took
advantage of the two Nonprofi t Security
Grant Program rounds in the com-
monwealth, a program created in 2019
following the Tree of Life Shooting the
year before to provide nonprofi ts, reli-
gious or not, with funds for increased
security measures.

For Temple Brith Achim in King of
Prussia, which received grants twice
6 Garrett Stubbs joined the Phillies
before the 2022 season.

Courtesy of The Phillies/Miles Kennedy
this year, increased security measures
have led to increased feelings of safety
among congregants, according to syn-
agogue President Steven Kantrowitz.

“Clearly, we’re safer now than we
were when we started doing this about
three-and-a-half years ago,” he said.

“But it’s constant vigilance.”
Area Jews Champion Eff orts to
Help Fleeing Ukrainians
When Russia invaded the Ukraine in
February, the war displaced millions of
Ukrainians, including many Jews, both
young orphans and ailing Holocaust sur-
vivors. Among the many Jewish organiza-
tions in the area to respond with sup-
port was KleinLife, an organization that
already served a large population of
Russian and Ukrainian Jews in Northeast
Philadelphia. In addition to raising money to sup-
port the Jewish Federation of Greater
Philadelphia’s aid eff orts, KleinLife
continued their social work and cre-
ated a summer camp, which served 50
Ukrainian refugee children.

As summer turned to fall, KleinLife
continued to provide care for these chil-
dren in an aft erschool program. Many of
the mothers of these children take advan-
tage of KleinLife’s English as a Second
Language courses, which can help
non-native English speakers fi nd a job.

“It’s a community of support,” said
DECEMBER 29, 2022 | JEWISHEXPONENT.COM
Children from the Mishpacha
Children’s Orphanage fl ee from
Odessa across the Moldovian border.

Courtesy of Moussia Goldstein
KleinLife Executive Director Andre
Krug. Krug hopes to expand KleinLife’s ESL
program and summer camp in the com-
ing year.

Phillies Catcher Refl ects on Bar
Mitzvah’s Role in Career, Life
Th ough he didn’t play in the World
Series, Phillies catcher Garrett Stubbs
still helped the Phightin’s make it back
to the top.

In a May interview, several months
before Red October, Stubbs spoke
about his Jewish upbringing and the
infl uence his bar mitzvah had on
how he plays baseball. Between rush-
ing between Hebrew school for bar
mitzvah prep and numerous baseball
games, Stubbs learned the importance
of strictness and routine.

“Just that discipline of doing some-
thing every single week and then get-
ting to accomplish that was defi nitely a
stepping stone,” he said.

A Post-COVID Day at Golden
Slipper Camp in the Poconos
COVID was quiet in the headlines this
year, with most acclimating to a new
normal and learning to live with the
pandemic. Golden Slipper Camp is one of many
Jewish institutions doing so. Over the
summer, camp appeared mostly back to
how it was pre-pandemic, though with
Josh Shapiro talks to supporters at
a canvass kickoff in Swarthmore on
Oct. 8.

Photo by Jarrad Saff ren
about 100 fewer campers than previous
years and a pre-camp testing policy.

In the fi rst session of the camp, a
COVID outbreak among campers
caused camp staff to pivot, keeping the
groups in their smaller bunk cohorts
to limit spread. When they enacted a
similar policy for the camp’s second
session, there were no COVID cases.

Camp Director Justin Guida antic-
ipates an even more normal summer
in 2023, with attendance back up and
with no COVID restrictions.

Th e camp will also celebrate its
75th anniversary next summer, with
additional programming to mark the
occasion. Josh Shapiro Versus
Doug Mastriano. Will the
Jewish Democrat Become
Pennsylvania’s Next Governor?
One of the most contentious races of
the 2022 election season took place in
our own backyard, with gubernato-
rial candidates Josh Shapiro, a Jewish
Democrat and local day-school gradu-
ate, facing off against Doug Mastriano,
a Republican who has been linked to
antisemites. With the election going Shapiro’s
way, 2023 will mark the inauguration
of the commonwealth’s fi rst Jewish
governor since Milton Shapp in 1971. JE
srogelberg@midatlanticmedia.com