A Flowchart Haggadah
Here's a special way to celebrate Tu Bishvat. Use this beautiful Tu Bishvat Haggadah--only one page long--to guide a seder that you create!
Bring stories, poems, songs, and teachings to fill the seder from your own experiences. Use the flowchart Tu Bishvat Haggadah from neohasid.org to structure your seder, from beginning to end, by following the order from the Kabbalah of what fruits to eat and what wine to drink. Or take teachings from any Haggadah, or from neohasid.org, and then arrange them using the flowchart. Or use the flowchart ...
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Why do we have a covenant? What is the ultimate purpose of the Torah's covenant?
Download the four-page study guide on Eden, the flood, and the Shmitah cycle here. You'll find meticulous translations from Torah combined with commentary to help you discover connections between the tragic history of humanity before Abraham found in Genesis, and the Torah's ultimate plan to rectify that tragedy. These passages from Genesis, Exodus and Leviticus help answer the question of why we have a covenant--perhaps the most important answer one could give for our ...
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שורשים – דורשים קהילה
עינט קרמר
רציונאל: אחד ממאפייני התרבות הגלובלית בה אנו חיים היום הינו ה"ניתוק" מן השורשים – הפיסיים והרוחניים כאחד, והתרכזות בטוב וביפה ב"הווה". שיעור זה יעסוק בנושא השורשים והשורשיות מבחינות שונות.
במליאה: המנחה מקריא את "עץ הזית 2002" ומפתח דיון סביב השיר ...
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If every household in the United States replaced just one pack of bath tissue made from virgin fiber with tissue made from recycled fiber (4 rolls per pack and an average of 430 sheets per pack) the savings on emissions of CO2, (the key gas responsible for creating global warming) would equal the following:
not burning 22,747,359 gallons of gas in the average car (4)
planting 9,098,943 trees (5)
the energy saved by installing 1,516,490 low flow shower heads. (3)
the energy saved by 909,894families doing their laundry, twice a week for a ...
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1. Send a virtual postcard to the US Forest Service at http://www.ourforests.org/ to support an effective policy to protect our national forests.
2. Reduce junk mail. Send a letter to the Direct Marketing Association, Mail Preference Service, POB 9008, Farmingdale, NY 11735-9008 asking to remove your name from mailing lists.
3. Buy one forest-friendly alternative to an everyday product. Some suggestions: avoid paper cups by investing in a reusable travel mug, buy stationary from tree-free paper or recycled paper with at least 50% post-consumer waste, share ...
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You can help slow global warming--and save money over the long term--by reducing your household use of energy. Here are some ideas:
Walk, bike, take the bus, ride the train.
When purchasing your next vehicle, select the most fuel-efficient model possible. Click here for a listing of automobile fuel efficiency by model.
Look for the "Energy-Star" label on appliances, indicating certification as a highly energy efficient product. Energy Star, a U.S. EPA program, certifies all major appliances, furnaces, boilers, computers and monitors, and even ...
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Environmentally Caring Practices for the Home
The way we live our lives has an impact on the world around us. Our health, and the health of wildlife and the environment are affected by the chemicals we use in our home. Pesticides used in farming, gardening, and in the home can pollute the land, water and air. Many household chemicals used for cleaning contain phosphates, chlorine and other chemicals which harm humans and wildlife. The following are some recommendations for living in a healthy and low-impact way:
REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE - at home, office, and ...
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Maryland Organic Backyard Initiative: backyard gardeners and farmers trading organic produce.
Website: takoma.mobi
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OYL! -- Corruption, the Spirit, the Earth, & Us
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 5/14/2010
Bechukotay
Climate policy
Festivals, Life-cycle, & Climate crisis
Global Scorching
Tisha B'Av
Click here to see a listing of all recent blog posts
This is not an oil "spill" we are facing in the Gulf, the way water might spill from a dish or oil from a tanker -- a finite amount in the first place, and then we clean up.
This is more like piercing, penetra...
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Yankee Doodle, 2010
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 5/27/2010
Festivals, Life-cycle, & Climate crisis
Global Scorching
Fourth of July
[In the British Army of 1776, officers wore on their epaulettes what today we call "gold braid" or "scrambled eggs." They called it "macaroni."
[In the rag-tag American Army of 1776, made up of farmers straight from the fields and furrows, many officers were elected by the men, and stuck a casual feather in their hats to denote their rank.
[The ...
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Tell Congress: The Earth is not for Burning
Climate policy
Tisha B'Av
Action Description:
Tell Congress: The Earth is not for Burning
There are now two different Climate Policy bills before the US Senate. Most of the Big Media are mentioning only one -- sponsored by Senators Kerry & Lieberman. It panders to the power of Big Oil, Big Coal, Big Nukes, Big Bankers.
Yet the Gulf disaster caused by BP's arrogance should have taught us that the last thing we want to do is increase the top-down, unaccountable, ...
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Clouds, Yom Kippur, & Climate Crisis in the Balance
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 9/18/2008
Festivals, Life-cycle, & Climate crisis
Global Scorching
Yom Kippur
”Rabbi David Seidenberg, neohasid.org, rebduvid86@hotmail.com
David is the Eco-Judaism Fellow of the Shalom Center
We read in the Yom Kippur liturgy, “I have blotted out your transgressions like a thick cloud, and your sins like a cloud.” [Machiti kha’av p’sha’ekha v’khe’anan chatotekha, shuvah eilai ...
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Beyond the Gulf Disaster: Tisha B'Av & Prayerful Grass-roots Action to Heal the Earth
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 5/17/2010
Devoting Jewish Holidays to Peace
Festivals, Life-cycle, & Climate crisis
Tisha B'Av
Just as the oil blow-out in the Gulf grew from Big Oil’s unwillingness to restrain itself from gobbling up even the most hidden sources of fossil-fuel energy, so the growing planetary climate crisis grows from the same insatiable hunger. Big Oil and Bog Coal have bevcome “drug ...
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Hanukkah, Oil, & the Green Menorah: Talking Points for Sermons and Op-Ed Pieces
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 11/7/2007
Beha'alotekha
Festivals, Life-cycle, & Climate crisis
Global Scorching
Hanukkah
By Rabbi Jeff Sultar & The Shalom Center’s Green Menorah Covenant Campaign
(215) 438-2983 Greenmenorah@shalomctr.org
During Hanukkah, we celebrate the use of one day’s worth of oil to meet 8 days’ needs. Hanukkah can be seen, then, as the festival that has the most to ...
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Jews Challenge Environmental "Protection" Agency With Trees for Life
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 1/24/2008
Global Scorching
Tu B'Shvat
Report by: Rabbi Jeff Sultar, director
Green Menorah Campaign of The Shalom Center
215/438-2983
In response to The Shalom Center’s call for the Environmental Protection Agency to live up to its middle name, Jewish groups brought living trees to regional EPA offices in New York City and Philadelphia on January 21, the trees’ Rebirthing Day in Jewish tradition...
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"Eicha" for the Earth: The Text of a Ceremony of Sorrow, Hope, & Action
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 6/18/2010
Climate policy
Festivals, Life-cycle, & Climate crisis
Tisha B'Av
Interreligious Relations
As explained elsewhere on our Website, Tisha B'Av (the midsummer day of Jewish mourning for the ancient Temples in Jerusalem, and of hope for a transformed future) can be focused on the endangered Earth as our Temple.
What follows is the text of what such an Earth-centered ...
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Rainbow Sign: A Jewish Approach to the Danger of Global Eco-Disaster
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow | 8/9/2010
Noah
Earth
Festivals, Life-cycle, & Climate crisis
Endangered Species
[This essay is Chapter XVII of Rabbi Arthur Waskow's book Godwrestling -- Round 2, published by Jewish Lights and available at discount from The Shalom Center's "on-line bookstore "Shouk Shalom" by clicking here. Though this essay was originally written in the light of the nuclear arms race of the early ...
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Procedure:
1) Divide into groups of 3 - 5 participants. Assign each group one theme from the text sheet (attached).
2) Direct the students to read the quotes under their theme and answer the questions. Make sure the students actually answer the questions and do not move to the second part till directed.
What makes the most sense in the texts you read?
What ideas seem weird, wrong or backwards?
What is the moral or message that these texts teach us?
Is this message this applicable today? How can you apply ...
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Participate in the JCPA/COEJL Earth Aid Kit Campaign. JCPA and COEJL have partnered with Earth Aid Enterprises to offer Earth Aid Kits to the Jewish community. Earth Aid Kits provide a collection of premium energy-efficiency products carefully selected to improve quality of life while reducing energy consumption, decreasing electric bills and carbon footprints. These kits can be used as a way to promote education about energy issues, fundraiser or community-service project. The possibilities are endless: Synagogues may choose to sell Earth Aid kits (or gift certifica...
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On December 19, 2007, the US Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency denied California’s petition to limit greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks. California had sought to establish stronger emissions standards for cars and trucks sold in the state. The Clean Air Act explicitly allows California to adopt its own standards. And the federal government has granted similar requests fifty times since 1968. The last time it denied a request was in 1975. California has since sued EPA and seventeen states (representing more than one-half of the U.S. ...
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