From The President

Shalom Chaverim,

It was wonderful to see so many of you at High Holiday services this year. I found the services to be warm and meaningful and I hope you did as well. We owe a big TODAH RABAH to Tom Gough who stood in at the last minute to work with Cantor Delton on the selection and order of the services. I would also like to thank everyone who had an honor during services, and everyone who was involved in the children's service, babysitting, and break the fast.

As I mentioned in my Rosh Hashana address, volunteers are the foundation of any successful organization. The work that needs to be done at CBS takes many more people than our 5 paid employees, so we need many volunteers to keep our shul running.

The Board of Directors' vision, as we agreed at our Board Bonding session this summer, is to make CBS into a thriving Jewish Community Center. A place where you can fulfill your religious, educational, and social needs. If you have not been to the synagogue on Sunday morning since Sunday school started in September, I suggest you drop by. This past Sunday, not only did we have religious school, but also I found parents sitting inside the social hall writing on their computers, knitting, drinking coffee together, and participating in the children's Ruach session. It was a very nice, casual morning with bagels and coffee provided by the religious school.

I would like to see more of this happening. Do you like to play scrabble or canasta? Come down on Sunday morning and I'm sure you will find someone who would like to play. You don't even need to bring your scrabble board--we have several, and we even have a Hebrew version. I know Leo Egel is always looking for someone to play ping-pong with, so make a date and let's start a ping-pong tournament. Coming on Sunday mornings is the first step to get to know other people and find a committee or a project that you may want to get involved with at CBS.

Each month I will devote a portion of this column to volunteer opportunities at CBS as well as Social Action/Tikun Olam projects. For instance, Interfaith Ministries is in desperate need of paper bags for their food pantry. Please bring in your extra paper bags and also, the next time you go grocery shopping, ask your grocer for a few extra paper bags. If everyone got 10, we could provide several hundred bags to the food bank. Lynis Chaffey, Executive Director of Interfaith Ministries, sent me an e-mail recently and said "Your congregation has been a real blessing in the many ways you support the needs of our community, and we are so grateful for your help."

Which brings me to our volunteer project for this month's Bulletin. During Sukkot, I had the pleasure of dining in the Brotslaw's Sukkah with Tom and Linda Gough. Tom had an idea for a holiday meal at CBS on Christmas for the residents of a local homeless shelter such as the Haven or Redwood Center. It would be a mitzvah for us to open our social hall to those who are less fortunate.

We also need service leaders for Friday night and Saturday mornings. Anyone who has ever had a Bar/Bat Mitzvah is capable of leading services, or you can lead with a friend. We encourage USYers, families, canasta groups, the choir, or anyone with an interest to volunteer for this Mitzvah. If you would like to just give a drash (sermon) on Friday night or lead a Saturday Torah study, we encourage you to step forward. Your drash can be on any subject that you think is relevant to our congregation. Perhaps your child wrote an essay for school that was so phenomenal you would like to share it with the congregation. Many of us would like to hear what our youth are studying in school.

If you haven't been to Saturday morning services you don't know what you're missing. The members of our Saturday morning minyan are volunteering to (learn to) read Torah and to give drashes on the Torah portion. We sometimes don't get a minyan, so that should automatically tell you that you will not be intimidated by this small, intimate group!

We also have the opportunity for people to take down the Sukkah this Sunday, November 2nd, during religious school, and the bricks that are around the trees are out of alignment and could be reset. Between now and December, Joel Youngheim needs volunteers to help sell tickets for "Latkes & Vodkas."

So there are many opportunities for you to get involved at CBS. If you are interested in helping with any of these events, please contact me by e-mail or phone. I look forward to seeing all of you at our general membership meeting on Sunday, December 7, at 7:00 p.m. Wishing you all Shabbat Shalom and a season of Merry Mitzvot-Making to our CBS family.

Religious School News

Weren't those kids great?! It was nice to have the Religious School students participate in the High Holy Day Services last month. I know they enjoyed their experience (ok, we did have a few quiet and nervous kids) and the opportunity to be a "part" of the service versus a participant made the day that much more special to the students. Thank you for allowing the teachers and the kids to be a part of your High Holy Day experience as well.

Now that the holidays are behind us, the Religious School will begin a new curriculum--The Chai Curriculum (www.urj.org/chai/core/). I know it may seem a bit odd to use a program developed by URJ for a Conservative congregation, so here are some things you should know:

• The program has 27 lessons per class based upon:
• Torah -- Developing the skills to study Torah is essential to integrating Torah into our lives;
• Avodah -- The work we do to find sacred connections to God, community, and self;
• G'mulit Chasidim-- Highlighting our responsibility to perform acts of "kindness" and tzedakkah to make the world a better, holier place.
• The Chai program is designed for "religious" schools that meet only once or twice a week.
• We have secured the "Conservative Chai" adaptation for Conservative Synagogues to use in conjunction with the Chai program.
• The curriculum will allow us to have two years of education per grade which allows for continuity in programming for students.
• The curriculum enables teachers to focus on specific lesson plans (and makes life easy on substitutes) each week that will have long lasting implications to our students as well as an impact on the knowledge of the teachers.
• The program comes with workbooks for each student so that there are built in study and class work materials for the kids.

This does not mean we will only teach the Chai curriculum. We will have a lot of other education going on. For instance:

• Music & Cultural Dance lessons (just wait until Cafe Shalom to see 'em!).
• Hebrew Language -- alphabet, vocabulary, and prayer studies.
• Jewish Holidays & History.

I know that sounds like a lot, but it is actually what you asked for on recent surveys; a consistent curriculum for a Jewish education that connects our students to our faith.

The only ingredient missing now is YOU. Beginning Sunday, November 2nd, we will start having Adult Ed/Jewish Social Studies programs during Sunday School. We invite each of you to come by and join us in learning different and fun aspects of Jewish History each week from about 10 a.m.-11 a.m. Classes will be open -- no reservations required!

Topics we will cover will be: From Hanukah to the Holocaust -- History of the Diaspora, Ancient Israel -- the oldest Title Search ever, The Five Forms of Judaism...just to name a few.

In closing, be sure to let the kids know how much you enjoyed their participation in services. We will be having more fun and educational Family Services each month as well as integration of our students into more of our Holiday services. Thanks so much for letting the students take a more participatory role in CBS Life!

Remember, half of every subscription to J- will go to Congregation Beth Shalom.  See your Bulletin for details.