As a result of a number of Education Committee meetings, we have determined that rather than thinking of ourselves as a Religious School, we want to think of what we do as lifelong Jewish learning at BJC. We want our students to see themselves as part of a continuum of learners, and we want to offer more robust adult education programming.

To that end, I am inviting anyone to submit a question or questions to me at under the rubric “Anything You Wanted to Know about Judaism but Didn’t Know Whom to Ask.” That is, all those niggling little customs, words, ideas you’ve always wondered about. but thought you should already know and were too embarrassed to ask. Without revealing your identity, I will post the questions and answer them to the best of my ability or with the Rabbi’s help in future Insights issues.

A magical mystical journey of spiritual self-improvement.

Mystical teachings, lessons from the Sages in self-improvement, and a moment to breathe.

During the Omer period we have the opportunity to break open klipot (negative shells) from within our being, releasing the light that has been trapped by the story of our lives. An accessible beginner’s entry into Jewish mysticism.

Note: While Rabbi Sunny’s sessions are on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday through May 13, the actual counting began on Sunday, March 28 and runs through Sunday, May 16.

Four times a year, on Yom Kippur, and the three pilgrimage festivals, we observe Yizkor. To join with others to remember our beloveds who are no longer with us, elevates the spirit.

On the last day of Pesach / Shabbat morning April 3, at 10 AM, we come together to observe the timeless ritual of memory. Bring your memories to the Zoom screen and open your heart.

The movie Holy Silence is the story of Pope Pius Xll and the Catholic Church's response to the evils of Nazism and the Shoah. The film screening is at 6:30 PM, with a discussion at 8 PM led by Mitchell Kraus, docent at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Pre-screening of the film is available through PBS with a subscription or on Amazon Prime.

The evening will conclude with the recitation of memorial prayers and Kaddish.

BJC is joining with the Jewish Community Relations Council of Washington, DC in their commemoration of the 6 million Jewish victims of the Holocaust.

On Yom Ha'Shoah, virtually gather with communities around the world to remember the systematic persecution and murder of six million Jews and millions of other innocent people from a variety of ethnic, religious, and national backgrounds. Hear important messages about the lasting impact of the Holocaust from survivor Esther Geizhals and direct descendants of other survivors, followed by the opportunity to discuss and reflect on the stories shared.

Pre-registration is required.

CLICK HERE to register

The Inter Congregational Partnership Committee—members of Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church (BHPC) and Bethesda Jewish Congregation (BJC)—invite you to a panel discussion to discuss the plight of the Uyghurs.

The Uyghurs are Muslim Chinese, belonging to one of the 56 officially recognized ethnic groups of China. They live in Xinjiang Province in Northwestern China. For the past few years, the Chinese government has been committing genocide against the Uyghurs. They have been subjected to arbitrary and brutal imprisonment and forced into labor camps. Men have been taken from their towns and separated from their families. Women are forcibly sterilized, and the population is re-educated for the purpose of eradicating Uyghur religion, culture, and language. Children are sent to indoctrination centers. We cannot stand by idly as genocide, oppression, and slavery are inflicted against the Uyghurs.

When you participate, you will learn about the mass atrocities against the Uyghurs and how to become advocates on their behalf. After the Holocaust, we vowed “NEVER AGAIN.” Help to fulfill this vow on behalf of the Uyghurs.

The panel will include: Serena Oberstein, the Executive Director of Jewish World Watch, a faith-based organization combating genocide; Rayhan Asat is a Uyghur human rights attorney and a senior fellow at the Raoul Wallenberg Center for Human Rights; Lina Lengber, is involved in the national movement for human rights education and is writing her dissertation on the genocide being waged against Uyghurs; and Eva Dou, the Washington Post's China business and economy correspondent. She was part of the Wall Street Journal team that won the 2018 Loeb Award in international reporting, for a series on China.

Here are some resources for more information:

Join us for BJC’s second Story Slam of the year! In honor of Yom Ha’atzmaut, the topic is “Living in Israel.”

If you have a story about a trip to Israel, email [email protected] to sign up for a 5-minute story telling slot.

Our April Movie Night will also have an Israeli theme. Check your BJC Now for more details.

"The Winter is Over, the Sound of Singing is Heard" - Song of Songs

5 PM - Youth Activities: Have fun together, bring your friends, stick around to sing, enjoy smores, and celebrate Havdalah

6 PM - Adult Schmooze, Fire Pit, and Sing Along

7 PM - Smores and Havdalah for All

Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church reached out to the Intercongregational Partnership Committee (ICPC), to join the BHPC-sponsored first Interfaith Climate Summit. In this exciting three-part series, we will examine our experiences and feeling about climate change in the context of our faiths. The sessions will be led by staff from BHPC and Interfaith Power & Light in the DMV.

Here are the three components:

Sunday, April 18: Outdoor Youth Summit at 6601 Bradley Boulevard, 3:30-5 PM.

Sunday, April 25: Inter-Generation ZOOM Dialogue on the Climate Crisis, 12 PM.

Sunday, May 23: Moved to Action: A ZOOM Workshop, 12 PM

On Sunday, May 2 at 3 PM, BJC and BHPC will host the virtual presentation of a short documentary film on urban gun violence, presented by the Perceptions Film Forum/DC Area Interfaith Network for Gun Violence Prevention.

This inspirational, 14-minute film, “Do-It-Yourself Gunshot Treatment on Chicago’s South Side,” sheds light on urban emergency first response training.

Following the film, there will be remarks and Q&A's with the filmmaker and an urban health professional who deal with this major public health crisis on a daily basis.

Check BJC Now for the Zoom links.  

In Case You Missed it, BJC had a special Wine and Chocolate Tasting event led by our new Administrator Elizabeth and her husband Ralph Kirkpatrick.

Luckily for us, they are both wine aficionados as well as chocolate lovers. It was a delightful evening.

If you had attended you would know how to pair reasonably priced red wines with a range of chocolate (from light to dark), share stories and laughs with others, and know what is Elizabeth’s favorite chocolate candy. Elizabeth shared what Spanish bubbly may be better than Prosecco—do you know?

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At another event on March 16^th, after Havdalah we held BJC’s own version of TED Talks. The evening was filled with learning new things, not only about subjects, but also about our members.

Liam Covitz (Rabbi Sunny and Rebbetzin Yaffah’s Grandson): All About Shabbat

Karen Levi: Speech Disorders and Politics

Ralph Kirkpatrick: Car Detailing and Repair

Sandra Walter: How Humanitarian Aid Takes Flight

Diane Horn: Cooking with Middle Eastern Spices

BJC is joining with the Jewish Federation of Greater Washington’s Sara & Samuel J. Lessans Good Deeds Week.* Over 60 partners and thousands of participants across DC, MD, and Northern VA will work to address the year-round problem of food insecurity. Join us as we fill the shelves of local food pantries, feed those who are hungry, and make a difference all week long. For our project, BJC will once again collect food for Manna.

We're starting a day early: from Saturday, April 10 – Sunday, April 18, Manna will have three blue bins on the church-side parking lot in the yellow area. The bins are unattended, and you can drop off food at any time. Here’s a quick list of what foods Manna needs most or download a flyer here:

Please help us make a difference for those for whom food insecurity is a regular, unrelenting problem. The BJC Board would like you to know that one of our three tzedakah donations this year will be to Manna. (Stay tuned to Insights to learn about the others.)

The Posner family—my wife Karen Anderson, our children Justin (17), Erica (15), and Georges (12), and I – have been BJC members since moving to Bethesda from Olney in early 2013. Previously, we belonged to Olney Kehila. We were introduced to BJC by Gary Sampliner, whom I had gotten to know professionally when he was a lawyer at the Treasury Department and I was a lawyer at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. As it turned out, Gary and I had more in common than our professional interests: We had grown up in the same town (Port Chester, New York), and I had gone to elementary school and high school with Gary’s younger brother, James. And if that weren’t coincidence enough, I soon discovered that BJC member Dan Goldberg also hailed from our hometown and that we had a common school friend. So, perhaps there is some invisible force drawing children of Port Chester to BJC.

Ours is an interfaith family (Karen having been raised a Lutheran). My experience as a Jew has been shaped by diverse influences. Growing up, my family belonged to a conservative congregation, but that choice was driven more by practical than philosophical considerations. We were not an especially observant family. My extended family included my grandfather Georges (after whom our son is named) who was actively involved in fund-raising and other activities in support of Israel, my father’s cousin who taught Yiddish and was passionate about myriad causes related to Judaism and social justice, second cousins who were drawn to orthodox Judaism in college and never looked back, and my uncle’s brother who was a composer of liturgical music, an assistant to Leonard Bernstein, and one of the leading authorities on Jewish music in the twentieth century. All of these influences, and more, have contributed to my Jewish identity.

In the years since we joined BJC, our engagement with the congregation has been primarily through the youth education program. Justin and Erica became Bar and Bat Mitzvah at BJC, and we look forward to Georges becoming Bar Mitzvah at BJC next March. I served on the board from 2018 to 2020 and was delighted by the opportunity that gave me to get to know the other members of the board and the BJC community a little bit better. Looking ahead to a post-COVID world and to a (sigh) not-too-distant future in which Karen and I will be empty nesters, I hope to become more involved with BJC-led community-focused projects.

Other fun facts about the Posner family: Karen is a doctor (a neuropsychiatrist specializing in the treatment and study of Huntington’s Disease and other neurological disorders), and I am a lawyer (specializing in international trade and international arbitration). Karen moved from University of Maryland Hospital to Georgetown University Hospital when we moved to Bethesda in 2013, and last year she became a full tenured professor at Georgetown. 

I have moved back and forth between government and private practice over the course of my career – returning to government last October as the Assistant General Counsel for International Affairs at the Treasury Department. Justin will graduate from Richard Montgomery High School in June and begin studying at the University of Chicago (Karen’s alma mater) in the fall. He has been an avid member of RM’s Quiz Bowl and Model UN teams and founder of RM’s Philosophy Club. Erica is a sophomore at Walt Whitman High School. She is a stellar lacrosse player, and during the pandemic she started what has become a thriving cookie business (happily serving the greater Bethesda community and beyond). Georges is a sixth grader at Pyle Middle School who loves soccer, Minecraft (among other online games that I understand only dimly), and chess.

Frequently over the past year, I have thought about my relationship to my communities, including the BJC community. I eagerly look forward to rediscovering those communities when COVID is behind us.

Have you needed directions to navigate the payment systems in ShulCloud? Terri has created a PowerPoint, “ShulCloud Made Simple: Linking your bank account in 6 easy steps.” Click here to link to the instructions on our website, www.bethesdajewish.org

As always, no question is too insignificant or silly. Get in touch with Elizabeth at [email protected], and she'll help.