LINKS
Partners, Colleagues, and Associates

Partners and Associates

Congregation B'nai Israel is Rabbi Debra Orenstein's new home synagogue in Emerson, New Jersey: www.bisrael.com.

Makom Ohr Shalom was Rabbi Debra Orenstein’s previous synagogue in Tarzana, California: www.makom.org.

Reb Zalman’s Legacy Project will tell you more about this great teacher and how his students are helping to preserve his legacy: www.rzlp.org.

Jewish Lights is the publisher of Lifecycles, Volumes 1 and 2: www.jewishlights.com

OUR LEARNING COMPANY has produced tele-webinars with us and produces many distance learning events with notable Jewish scholars. OLC is committed to an inclusive learning environment that includes scholars and participants from throughout the spectrum of Jewish life. While OLC's live events afford registrants an opportunity to ask questions and interact with the scholars, all their products can be ordered as audio downloads and experienced at your convenience. Our two OLC webinars are: Meaningful Jewish Ritual and When The Soul Asks "When Do We Eat?" - Spiritual Preparation for Your Passover Seder with spiritual luminary Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi. Debra recommends OLC events, including:
Joseph Telushkin on the subject: Love Your Neighbor As Yourself, and
Rabbi Ed Feinstein on Seeing The World Through A Spiritual Lens, a discussion of the vision of Abraham Joshua Heschel.

Steve Rachwal designs our CD covers and other materials. He's a great designer and wonderful man: www.rachwal.com.

Mark Reden, a member of Makom Ohr Shalom, has taken many of the photos that appear on this website. To view more of Mark's photographs of Congregation Makom Ohr Shalom, please click here.

Service and Charities Focus

American Jewish World Service (AJWS) is an international development organization motivated by Judaism’s imperative to pursue justice. AJWS is dedicated to alleviating poverty, hunger and disease among the people of the developing world.

The Fistula Foundation is dedicated to preventing and curing obstetrical fistulas, holes that develop during childbirth between a woman’s birth passage and one or more of her internal organs. While we see very few fistulas in the West, they are rampant in the poor countries of Africa and Asia, due to malnutrition and inadequate obstetrical care. The results are catastrophic: women suffer infertility, incontinence, infections, foul smells, and, most seriously, abandonment by their families and communities. The good news is that cure rate for a relatively simple low-cost surgery is 90%, and prevention costs pennies, while curing other ills simultaneously.

Good People Fund , founded by some of the same folks who worked on Danny Siegel’s Ziv Tzedakah Fund, is named for the good people who do grass-roots charitable work, the good people who need those services, and the good people who lend their financial support.

Hadassah , the world’s largest Jewish women’s organization, does ground-breaking work in medicine and community-building, both in Israel and in the Diaspora.

Jewish World Watch (JWW) is a coalition of almost 60 synagogues throughout Southern California dedicated to advocating for the prevention of genocide and the proper care for its victims.

The Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) is the overseas arm of the American Jewish community, providing support to Jews and non-Jews across the globe. I grew up hearing about “the Joint,” and couldn’t initially figure out how some speakeasy was able to do so much good, world-wide.

The New Israel Fund (NIF) supports the vision of the Israeli declaration of independence: social justice and equality for all people in the Jewish State, without regard to religion, race, or gender. To date, NIF has supported 800 cutting-edge organizations with $200 million in grants.