H eadlines
Sermons Continued from Page 1
difference where we can.”
According to Brennan, this
means looking inward. It also
means looking around in your
physical space.

“Focus on people,” he said.

Once you do that, you
will realize that your sphere
of influence is bigger than
you thought, he said. You
can impact family members,
friends, even acquaintances.

“If everybody does that, the
amount of positivity is immea-
surable,” Brennan said.

Rabbi Eric Yanoff leads Adath
Israel, a Conservative congrega-
tion on the Main Line. This year,
when he speaks to members,
Yanoff is going to explain the
theory of Stanford University
sociologist Mark Granovetter,
whose work examines the layers
of relationships that form our
communities. Rabbi Eric Yanoff of Adath Israel in Merion Station
Photo by Michelle Camperson Photography
Our strongest connections
are with family members,
friends and co-workers,
according to the professor. Our
intermediate relationships are
with those we serve, those who
serve us and our wider social
network in general; that can
be our barbers, baristas and
fellow synagogue congregants,
among others.

You are invited to
R Remembrance
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o ryrryr y of o f All
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at 12 Noon
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Celebrating each life like no other.

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And our weakest connections
are the random interactions
beyond the intermediate layer,
like when we yell at people in
traffic. During COVID, with all
of its social restrictions, the
weakest layer faded, Yanoff
said. But so did the interme-
diate layer, and that’s a problem
we now need to correct.

Yanoff said those middle
connections make up the fabric
of society. Without them, we
tend to huddle with our own
people and become clannish.

“We’ve lost something,”
Yanoff said. “The ties that
connect us to a larger society.”
Rabbi Nathan Weiner leads
Congregation Beth Tikvah,
a Conservative synagogue in
Marlton, New Jersey. Weiner
agrees with both Brennan and
Yanoff: We should start with
our closest relationships and
build out to those vital inter-
mediate ties.

In his Rosh Hashanah
sermon, Weiner will empha-
size how the pandemic, even as
it kept us apart, taught us how
to come together again.

Beth Tikvah members went
grocery shopping for each
other. They picked up prescrip-
tions for each other. They used
technology to maintain and
deepen their community.

In addition to virtual
services, Weiner runs a
weekly study group on Zoom
with 20 people. One member
takes another to the doctor.

A different participant was
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Rabbi Nathan Weiner of Congregation Beth Tikvah in Marlton,
New Jersey 
Photo by Sharon Savitz
a shut-in before the group
started. “They have come to love one
another,” he said. “The connec-
tions are real.”
The rabbi’s speech will
remind congregants that
the digital space can deepen
community. But it also will
remind them that technology
can’t replace community.

Joy, warmth and meaning
come from real connections
with people around you. As the
rabbi put it, real joy does not
emerge from a Facebook like.

It comes from your neighbor
helping you up after you’ve
fallen. “People have rediscovered
that,” he said. “It’s almost like
we’ve hit the reset button.”
The pandemic, though, is
not yet over, and it continues to
lay bare the American conflict
between individual liberty and
communal good. And, too
often, according to Weiner,
individual liberty is winning.

That’s why Weiner will use
his Yom Kippur sermon to
remind congregants to priori-
tize the communal good.

Individual freedom is
essential for achieving that
good, according to the rabbi.

But with freedom comes a
social obligation to live the
mitzvot, to do justice, love in
kindness and walk humbly
with God.

“If we don’t have a common
sense of obligation to one
another, the system falls apart,”
Weiner said. “Society crumbles.”
Reconstructionist Rabbi
Alanna Sklover of Or Hadash
in Fort Washington is planning
to delve into 5782 being a
Shmita, or sabbatical, year.

That’s when Jews are supposed
to let the land lay fallow to
prepare it for future harvests.

The Shmita year is about
stepping back and reflecting on
lessons, according to the rabbi.

Then, we apply those lessons
in year one of the new agricul-
tural cycle.

So it’s a Shmita year in a
communal sense, too, Sklover
said. “We get this opportunity to
start with a fresh field,” she
said. l
jsaffren@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0740
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F TAY-SACHS
R F R E E E E
H eadlines
Inside Continued from Page 1
afterward. There are now 12 Jewish men
incarcerated in SCI-Phoenix.

Though the exact number of
incarcerated Jews there has
fluctuated over the years, it has
usually been around the size of
a minyan.

According to
Frank Jordan, who is incarcerated
at SCI-Phoenix, serving a life
sentence on homicide charges,
many of these men have
been friends for decades after
spending so many years on the
inside together. One inmate has
been incarcerated since 1963.

They are joined by a dozen
or so others: men interested
in Judaism who want to learn
more. Though he believes most
have pure intentions, Jordan
claims that — much like on the
outside — some just come to
services for the food that follows.

For Rosh Hashanah and
Yom Kippur, the men would
unstack chairs and drag them
into a circle, where a volun-
teer chaplain would lead them
in prayer and discussion. They
would roll their mobile Torah
ark out of the closet and closer
to the circle, where it would
become the service’s focal point.

Afterward, the havurah
would share a meal together,
one of two festive meals the
prison provides. Though the
prison would distribute the
meals, a couple of men from the
prison’s east side volunteered to
cook some Ashkenazi favorites:
roasted chicken, potato kugel,
(an albeit watery) matzah ball
soup. If they were fortunate,
the food would come from the
outside; the taste of a brisket
from several years back still
lingers in Jordan’s memory.

Last year, however, the
meal, the services and the
spiritual impact of the holiday
were different. And it will be
different this year, too.

Instead of gathering in the
makeshift chapel, the Jewish
men stayed in their cells,
watching services from Central
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM Two men reading Torah at the synagogue at SCI-Graterford, the state
prison replaced by SCI-Phoenix in 2018.
Jewish Exponent archives
community over the High
Holidays is counter to what
these holidays require from
Jews who observe.

For those on the outside, the
process of teshuvah, or repen-
tance and transformation,
takes place in community with
others. In addition to being
able to apologize to those one
has hurt, an individual also
needs encouragement to work
up the courage to confront
someone, write a letter to
someone they’ve hurt and
provide emotional support,
Bauer said. On the inside, that
process can’t happen.

“Many of the essential
components that make the tradi-
tional Jewish process of teshuvah
successful are not available to
people who are incarcerated this
year,” Bauer said.

In the Jewish tradition,
having the opportunity to
apologize to whom you’ve hurt
is a large part of teshuvah.

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Though some victims may
not be interested in getting an
apology, to deny a perpetrator
the ability to offer one to a
victim open to it undermines
the process of repentance.

“If you are taken out of the
community and put in a prison
See Inside, Page 21
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Rabbi David Bauer is the part-
time chaplain at SCI-Phoenix.

Photo by M. Sumner
Synagogue in New York broad-
cast on closed-circuit televisions.

They received a dressed-down
festive meal, complete with eight
ounces of a “calcium fluoride
beverage,” which doesn’t hold
a (Shabbat) candle to beloved
Kedem grape juice.

Because the social component
of the holidays is so important
to the inmates, the isolation of
last year’s tamped-down holiday
observations was devastating.

“It’s heart-wrenching that
we can’t at least gather with
our crew,” Jordan said. “For
them to not allow us to come
together once a week or for our
High Holidays is ridiculous.”
According to Jordan,
the general
population of SCI-Phoenix is mostly
Rabbi Elyse Wechterman is a
volunteer chaplain at SCI-Phoenix.

Courtesy of the Reconstructionist
Rabbinical Association
vaccinated. Still, at this
point, Rabbi David Bauer, the
part-time prison chaplain at
SCI-Phoenix, said that due to
concerns over the delta variant,
the east and west sides of the
prison won’t come together for
services this year. Just as last
year, the men will likely observe
the holidays from their cells.

“The level of fear around
any multiple-person event
turning into a superspreader
event just completely put the
kibosh on any of our more
ambitious plans of gathering
people together,” Bauer said.

Beyond the disappointment
of another year of separa-
tion from friends (in addition
to family members on the
outside), the loss of Jewish
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SEPTEMBER 2, 2021
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