Pesaḥ Yizkor

Tuesday, April 30, 10:30 am – Many of us at Passover experience an emotional response to the empty chair left by loved ones who are only with us in spirit. We invite you to join us during services for the opportunity to remember and reflect the life lessons and essence of close ones who are no longer with us in body. This is a powerful way for us to ritually hold memories and acknowledge their impact on our lives and to ask Divine Source to hold their souls in safe keeping.

The End of Festival service begins at 9:30 am, with Yizkor service starting around 10:30 am.

Summary of event details

  • Date: April 30, 2024
  • Time: 10:30 am
  • Where: Congregation Emanu-El Sanctuary
  • Cost: none
  • Registration: none
  • Contact: info@congregationemanuel.ca

Micha Menczer Gives Keynote Address State of Kansas Holocaust Commemoration

Mottel Menczer, courtesy of Micha Menczer

Monday, May 6, 1:00 pm Kansas CDT (11:00 am in Victoria Pacific Daylight Time) – With pleasure, we congratulate Micha Menczer, who has been invited to give the Keynote Address at the State of Kansas Holocaust Commemoration. Micha is a founding active member of Emanu-El’s Shoah Project and is committed to the preservation of memory and preservation of the stories of Holocaust survivors, including those of his father, Mottel Menczer. Micha’s talk will be live streamed, and you can join by registering.

Summary of event details

There’s Still Time to Attend the UnYeshiva!

Tuesday, April 30 – Judaism Unbound’s UnYeshiva courses are taught by some of the most inspiring, knowledgeable, and creative Jewish voices of the moment. You can be a part of it beginning next week—zero need to be a scholar!

A bit about The UnYeshiva, in their own words: “Through our classes, we seek to empower all Jews, regardless of background with the knowledge to reimagine the Jewish future with confidence, creativity, and chutzpah. We offer live, online courses that are geared toward anyone who wants to learn. We also have created several curated playlists from our vast catalogue of original video and audio which form self-guided courses exploring a range of subjects. All classes are recorded for enrolled students to watch back afterwards.”

There are 4 exciting mini-courses to choose from, each lasting a total of 3 sessions. These courses are affordably priced using a sliding scale, and scholarships are available upon request. Bartering is actually an option! Here they are:

I. Prayer as Home for the Soul: Abraham Joshua Heschel’s Teachings on Prayer with Avra Shapiro

II. The Sacred Shmuck: Uncovering Your Inner Jewish Fool with Danielle Levsky

III. A Song I Heard the Ocean Sing: Judaism & Phish with Jessy Dressin

IV. Sephardic and Mizrahi Identities: Beyond Ashkenormativity with Hadar Cohen

Learn more here

Matching $85,000 Campaign: We Did It- and Then Some!

Thanks to our wonderful membership, we have achieved -and surpassed! – our matching campaign goal!

Over 100 donors donated a total of $122,394.10!

Donations ranged from $18 to $10,000. We are so grateful for every single one. 

Thank you to everyone who participated, and a special thanks to the three anonymous families who contributed our $85,000 match. 

Including that initial match, this month we’ve raised $207,394.10 toward our Heritage Synagogue Restoration!

Combined with previous fundraising and including a generous grant from Vancouver’s Ronald S. Roadburg Foundation, we have raised over $599,000 toward our restoration! 

As our B’nei Mitzvah children wrote, “We have a responsibility to care for and preserve the building and the memories it holds. It’s important to have a space for our children and grandchildren to live, study and love here.”

We could not have said it better and are so thankful for the tremendous generosity and support that is allowing us to restore our heritage sanctuary.

Our overall fundraising goal is $950,000.  We have applied for Heritage grants at the city, provincial, and federal levels and we will update you when we have news on those outcomes.

Our fundraising team continues to be hard at work: next up, we have a series of fabulous events celebrating Emanu-El’s 160th anniversary this summer. 

Stay tuned and thank you! 

Summary of event details

Welcome Duggan Cayer

We are thrilled to announce the onboarding of Emanu-El’s first ever Program Coordinator, Duggan Cayer—and since you’re family, you can call him Duggie. Duggie (he/him) is a literary and marketing translator who, in addition to being a frequent contributor to ELLE magazine, specializes in helping charities amplify their communications with the public, governments, and donors. During the acute phase of the pandemic, he also gained meaningful experience working for Jewish community in Vancouver. 

As far as Judaism goes, Duggie is into learning Talmud SVARA-style, reading piles of books (currently Shai Held’s Judaism Is About Love), trying on different ways to daven, listening to every podcast ever (see Judaism Unbound), and being in community on chagim. Duggie is a resident of the Oaklands, living beside his brother, brother-in-law, and dachshund niece and nephew Gladys and Boris. 

What does an Emanu-El program guy do, you ask? Basically, Duggie will be entrusted with supporting our rabbi, Board, Executive Director, committees, and entire kehillah (you!) in dreaming up and delivering programming that reflects, enriches, and challenges our growing community. He’ll also be a driving force behind the shul’s marketing and communications endeavours, crafting a look and feel / messaging to attract future friends while energizing the folks who already love us.  

Duggie really wants to get to know you! So please email duggan@congregationemanuel.ca to set up a Tuesday meeting here at the synagogue during his in-person office hours (2:00-6:00 PM), or anytime throughout the week at one of Victoria’s many scrumptious cafes.  

Join us in wishing Duggie a warm welcome to the Congregation Emanu-El team! 

Pesaḥ Market

Matza in the office! The Market is closed but we still have Matza including organic spelt & egg Matza, matza meal, matza ball & soup mix, AND gluten free matza meal.

In addition, there is gefilte fish (frozen), grape juice, honey, ketchup, mayo, oil, chocolates, Wissotzky teas, and Elite Instant Coffee.

Please bring your own bags.

Payment by cash, cheque, or e-transfer is preferable.  We will also accept credit card payment.

Our office hours are limited due to the holiday.

Friday 19 April, Susan is in the building until 4:30 pm but you’ll need to pound on the windows, she can’t hear the doorbell from her office!

Thursday 25 April normal office hours 9:30 am – 2:30 pm.

Inscribe a Loved One’s Name on the Zachor Remembrance Wall

The Zachor Wall graces the entrance to our historic cemetery.  Located within a natural Garry Oak meadow, the cemetery is filled with eclectic headstones and graves dating from 1861 to the present and is the home of the Shoah/Holocaust Memorial of Victoria.

The ZACHOR Remembrance Wall, made from the Cemetery’s bedrock, will have the simple name engraved directly on the rock in English and/or in Hebrew, without dates.  Your loved one’s life story is also part of this beautiful remembrance. Their story along with a photograph will be included on the Cemetery webpage.

For more information and pricing:  

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MKLcuxdU7lepovsOcSp-e-RKhuC8TGcR/view?pli=1

zachor-wall-form-2024Download

Summary of event details

Siddur Shiur

Shabbat, April 20, 1:00 pm to 2:00 pm – Join us in learning about the Siddur one prayer at a time. We meet weekly after Shabbat services to learn about, discuss and practice prayers in the Siddur.

This group is great for anyone who is thinking about coming to Synagogue more but is unfamiliar with the prayers or for those who are knowledgeable and would like a space to share what they know. Everyone is welcome and no prior knowledge is needed.

You can register at ​​https://forms.gle/YmcJEtNprFnwXb3K9

Summary of event details

Rosh Hodesh Iyyar Healing Circle

Wednesday, May 8, 7:00-8:30 pm, Emanu-El Sanctuary – “Ani HaShem Rofecha – I, G!d, am your Healer” Exodus 15:26

Please join Rabbi Hanna Tiferet, Nejama Ferstman, and Sari Shernofsky in an evening of prayers, stories and songs of healing.

The month of Iyyar, in the midst of the Omer Counting, is dedicated to healing.
We are all in need of healing these days–physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual.
We will Breathe into Being to remember who we are.
We will Sing and Pray with all our hearts.
We will Learn and Share to access the wisdom of our collective consciousness.
We will Laugh and Cry and embrace our shared humanity.

All are welcome!

Suggested Donation: $10 (to cover expenses and to support the shul’s restoration project)

Summary of event details

  • Date: May 8, 2024
  • Time: 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm
  • Where: Congregation Emanu-El Sanctuary
  • Cost: $10 suggested donation
  • Registration: none
  • Contact: info@congregationemanuel.ca

Duggie’s Passover Prep Podcast Pick

Chutzpod! is a frank and wide-ranging conversation on how to build a good life. Using real-life quandaries and millennia-old Jewish wisdom, Rabbi Shira Stutman and journalist Hanna Rosin bring a Jewish lens to life’s toughest questions every week.

With Israel destined to be top of mind for many this Passover, Hanna and Rabbi Shira give practical advice on how to experience a meaningful and less contentious seder by ways of ancient Jewish technology (a.k.a. text study) and modern approaches to gathering (e.g., “Priya Parker’ing the #$%^ out of it” – Rabbi Shira). This episode pick is called Israel and This Year’s Seder, and you’ll find the website link to it here in the newsletter. You can also listen to episodes of Chutzpod! on Spotify or your platform of predilection.  

I recommend this podcast pick as a way to mentally/spiritually/emotionally warm up for Pesach with a little loving intentionality. Additional Chutzpod! episode suggestions: Kosher Throuple, Who Gets to Be Jewish?, and The End of a Jewish Golden Age.

Wishing everyone a ḥag Pesaḥ kasher v’sameaḥ,

Your new Program Guy,

Duggie