I’m always eternally grateful to friends who have been kind enough to be financially generous to the organization that I run, Limmud NY. Now I’m reaching out to anyone who is willing to support us with an opportunity to help us raise money, and you won’t have to spend any money to make it happy.
Limmud NY is participating in American Express’s “Small Business Saturday” promotion on November 24th. If you donate $25 to Limmud NY, American Express will credit your account for the $25. You spend nothing and Limmud NY gets $25. You can do this with every American Express card you have.
It’s a very limited opportunity. You can sign up now, but you have to make your gift on Saturday, November 24th. It only requires two easy steps from you:
Step 1: Click here to register your card(s) now for Small Business Saturday with American Express. Please register now as American Express is limiting the number of participants. It will only take a couple of minutes.
Step 2: On Saturday, November 24th go to the Limmud NY website (www.limmudny.org), click on the “Donate” button, and use each registered American Express card to make a donation. This step can only be done on November 24th.*
If you would me to send you a reminder on November 24th, please send me a message here.
I’ll be honest, it’s been an intense time for Limmud NY. We’ve lost our regular offices due to Hurricane Sandy and have had to relocate for at least the next month or so. This is a great opportunity for us to have a big win. And you can help us make that happen.
It would mean the world to make and you’d make a huge difference if you share to your friends and family so they can register their cards today. If 1,000 people make (free) gifts of $25 to Limmud NY, we’ll raise $25,000. They only way to reach that number is to spread the word. The moment you take to pass on this information will help Limmud NY tremendously.
*Donations to Limmud NY in excess of $25 are tax deductible. American Express generally issues statement credits within 5 business days after your qualifying purchase, but the $25 credit may take up to 2 billing cycles to post to your account. Corporate cards are not eligible for this promotion.
I’m sure I’ll write about comics again someday (hahaha no I probably won’t until they make good ones again), but given my professional role in the Jewish community these days, I feel like I’m under some sort of obligation to say something profound about the fact that it’s Passover this week.
AND I HAVE SOMETHING FOR YOU MY FRIENDS!
This is actually my favorite Jewish holiday in terms of ritual. Irrespective of what it’s actually become in a commercial sense (seriously, God doesn’t say anything in the Torah to the effect of “hey, I hope you guys figure out how to make frozen pizza out of this), the notion of changing our lifestyles for a week can make for an interesting shift in perspective .
But I love the Seder most of all. It’s a night of storytelling, a meal combined with an infinitely adaptable open source curriculum, one that we’re empowered to continuously tweak so that our Story of liberation from Egypt then can be made relevant to our Story as both Jews and human beings today. It’s a time when we say “let all who are hungry come and eat,” and if we live that up to it’s truest form, we can feed whoever we want. As far as I’m concerned, the best Seder is one that includes people who do not consider themselves to be Jewish. Better than that is if they feel 100% welcome and comfortable, and even better if they can fully connect to the content of the learning at the meal.
I grew up at my father’s side as he led our family’s Seders for many years and it was one of my favorite things in the world. Every year, he searched for new and relevant content to bring to our experience of eating and celebrating together. When I was 27, I decided to stay here in New York and co-lead a Seder with some dear friends. It lived up to the standard that I listed above, and I was hooked. My parents were lovingly disappointed in their own way.
“Why don’t you come home for Passover anymore?”
“What were you two doing when you were my age?”
“We…oh, we were hosting Seders in our home for our friends.”
“Then it’s my turn. Y’all did a good job.”
I actually went back to Chicago to co-lead with my dad at a Seder last year, and it certainly was quite a wonderful time. The sharing and mixing of two different approaches led to a whole new kind of conversation, and I hope we can do it again someday. Even better: I look forward to hosting him in my own home in the not-too-distant future. But I’m back in Brooklyn this year, and getting ready to co-facilitate with a different friend. I can’t wait.
A couple years back, I did some sharing about Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, and I also offered a reflection exercise that can be used by anyone, irrespective of faith. Now I’m doing it again. You can use it for your Seder, or you can use it with your friends, depending on the situation. Totally up to you.
The only things you need are people, Post-It notes, pens/pencils and comfort with a writing exercise at your Seder.
The Context: At the Seder, we celebrate our ancestors liberation from slavery in Egypt. Putting aside the debate about the historicity of that particular narrative, it is an essential part of the Jewish Story. One of the most important pieces of the Seder is that we are asked to step into the shoes (sandals?) of our ancestors and view ourselves as if we were also slaves in Egypt. The challenge in our modern lives is that most of us cannot truly relate to this type of experience. We do, however recognize that we have brothers and sisters in this world whose history remains sadly to close to this experience, and we also recognize that there are those in this world who are in fact living as slaves. I’m glad to see that the conversation about fair labor and human trafficking is central to the Passover conversation in my community this year, and I look forward to the day when all people can only think of slavery as a sad memory as opposed to something that still exists in today’s world.
The purpose of this exercise is address the idea that we all have some version of personal bondage, something that holds us back from being the people that we would fully and truly like to become. (Let me add that I do not intend to diminish actual slavery with this, but it is meant to create a different type of relevant connection to the Seder).
The Exercise: Explain the notion of personal bondage, as I described it above. We all have the thing (or many things) in our lives, whatever it may be. Perhaps it’s an addiction to cigarettes or an overcommitment to our work lives over our personal lives. Everyone’s got something. Pass a Post-It note to everyone in your group, and ask each person to write that thing in a word or two onto their notes, and then to stick the notes to their foreheads. When everyone is done, have the group look around at what everyone has written.
Ask folks to raise their hands if they see at least one other note that they can relate to (hint: everyone will always raise their hands).
It’s a common experience. We all have those things that we wish we could change, that hold us back just a little bit. We want to be freed of them. It’s not always easy to do so, but at the Passover Seder, I like to create a moment where we symbolically try to let those things go. And sometimes, just sometimes, you can use that as an opportunity to start fresh from there.
Close the activity by placing a bowl in the center of the table, and asking each person to free themselves just for tonight by tearing up their Post-Its and placing them into the bowl. As an alternative, you can have people tear up the notes of others instead. Leave the bowl at the table as a reminder of those little struggles in our lives and the intention to move past them. Or pour wine on them or something. Totally up to you.
There you go: a thing for your Seder! Use it if you like.
So Limmud NY 2012 is coming up in January and as the Executive Director of the aforementioned organization, I could not possibly more excited. I am excited for a million reasons, among the biggest of which is the fact that my father, one Rabbi Carl Wolkin, will be attending Limmud for the first time ever.
This is sort of a thing, my friends.
And another thing! We will be co-teaching a session. This session will be called “I Love You, but You’re Wrong About Everything”. It’s basically going to be a father/son exploration of the fact that while both of us are deeply tired to Jewish life, have strong identities and a commitment to the community on a professional/personal level, we don’t have very much in common in terms of how we think of Judaism itself.
We thought about coming up with the content of the conversation on our own, but then we decided that it would be far more fun to crowdsource it. So we’re putting it to you, universe: what are the Jewish questions, ideas, conflicts and more that you would want to see my discuss with Carl, whether you’re coming to Limmud or not?
If you’ve got something, just throw it into the comments section and we’ll think it through!
(Note: some of you may think it would be funny to write something cute and snarky in the comments, something that you know we would never think about discussing. Please save everyone a couple minutes and refrain, since I’ll just remove it in moderation.)
Here is a list of comics that I would like to sell. They are all in pretty solid condition. Please make offers as to what books you want and what you would like to pay and I will tell you what I think of them. I ship priority mail unless you prefer another way.
Detroit Metal City, volumes 1-8
Bottomless Belly Button (cover price $29.99, light damage to the binding)
Pride of Baghdad HC
Fables: 1001 Nights of Snowfall HC
Top 10: The Forty-Niners HC
Hardware: The Man in the Machine TPB
The Best American Comics, 2006
Bone: The Dragonslayer HC
Noble Causes Archives 1
The Surrogates TPB
Whiteout TPB
Stormwatch: Final Orbit TPB
Legion of Super-Heroes: The Beginning of Tomorrow TPB
Sleeper: All False Moves TPB
The Sentry TPB
JSA: Justice Be Done TPB
Batman: Broken City TPB
Fight for Tomorrow TPB
Hitman: Ace of Killers TPB
Fear Agent Volume 1 TPB
The Annotated Mantooth, signed by Matt Fraction
Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume 1 TPB
Stormwatch: Change of Die TPB
Doktor Sleepless Volume 1 TPB
The Tourist TPB
The End League Volume 1 TPB
The Exterminators Volumes 1-5
The full run of Echo in trade
Animal Man, Volumes 1-2
Formerly Known as the Justice League TPB
Frank Miller/Simon Bisley’s Bad Boy HC
Hard Time: 50 to Life TPB
Hellblazer: Dangerous Habits TPB
Sandman, Volumes 1-3 TPB
Spider-Man: Back in Black TPB
Invincible Volume 12 TPB
Transmetropolitan: Year of the Bastard TPB
Ultimate Iron Man volume 1 TPB
Stray Bullets Volume 1 TPB
Seaguy TPB
Crisis on Infinite Earths TPB
Fables Volumes 1,2,6 TPB
The Incredible Hercules: Smash of the Titans HC
The Hood: Blood from Stones HC
Catwoman “The Wild Ride” and “The Dark End of the Street” TPB
Squadron Supreme TPB
Persepolis Volume 1 HC
I think that’s it for now. Click on the “contact me” link if you’re interested!
