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Wednesday
The day began with our service. Things went well overall; there were a couple glitches but nothing that really hindered us. We got lots of positive feedback. I received many compliments on my singing. We added the tzitzit paragraph of the Sh'ma and that went over well. I chanted weekday nusach for chatzi kaddish mostly correctly. Eventually I'll write up my more detailed notes on what we did.
Our group was challenged by having one person whose congregation reads everything in English, including the stuff they just did in Hebrew, and one person who's driven crazy by that. I agreed that we could do some of that. We did it for the v'ahavta because this is central text that's so important you must say it in a language you understand. Also, we needed to use it tactically; by jumping right in with the English we prevented people from automatically going straight to "lama'an tizkiru". The other place we did it was mourners' kaddish, because people need to be reminded from time to time what the words they say by rote mean. We received feedback that people would have accepted the latter in English alone and we didn't need to also do the Hebrew for people to feel satisfied.
Classes
The three main classes today were all taught by Rabbi Sam Joseph, who's a fairly engaging speaker. His first class, which I was really looking forward to, was called "systems: how to implement change". Sadly, it repeated a lot of material from his class last year, including the very same assessment test to figure out the filters through which you see the world. (Structural, human resources, political, symbolic.) There were some good ideas about seeing resistance through all of the filters (most people are strong in one and weak in one), but I wanted it to go deeper.
He did tell an intersting story: a congregation was facing a significant change (I think having to do with its religious school) that was stirring up a lot of controversy. They called a town meeting, and set up two sets of chairs facing each other. As people came in they were asked "for or against?" and directed to seating accordingly, so the sides were split. The first assignment was for small groups on each side to answer the question "what are the other side's arguments going to be?". While it was a long meeting that approach diffused some of the heat, he said.
Guiding principles in handling change:
- Am I paying attention to people, their needs, and their feelings?
- Am I being clear about new roles and requirements (the nitty-gritty details)?
- Am I providing a forum in which to hear the opposition? (My inner Machievelli says: sometimes asking is enough even if you then do what you planned all along. I don't think it's usually a good idea, but I know people do it.)
- AM I helping people let go of the familiar and move into a more meaningful future?
His third class was on self-evaluation. The premise is that most of us aren't going to get real feedback or performance review in our congregations, so we have to be able to do it ourselves. This turned into a strong recommendation for journalling, with some structured analysis. I can add some structured analysis to my journal. :-)
In the Hebrew class we read a passage from torah, breaking down several words in an attempt to translate. I learned new stuff about grammar. I learned how very, very different the biblical and modern languages are. Perhaps I should try to focus on the one I really want (biblical) and try to avoid cluttering my mind with the other until I get a better grounding. Don't know. Book recommendation: Biblical Hebrew for Students of Modern Israeli Hebrew by Marc Zvi Brettler. Yes, it's in English and Paul (the student rabbi) said you don't already have to be fluent in modern Hebrew to benefit from it. The bookstore had it on deep discount (I got it for $12 instead of $55), so I picked it up. The Hebrew I've picked up from Dani is modern; he doesn't know biblical. If nothing else, the book should help me have conversations with him.
Other stuff
A fair chunk of the rest of the day was taken up with preparations for our text study on Friday. I'll write more about this some other time.
We have two individual assignments, both to be delivered Saturday afternoon: a d'var torah and a eulogy. I'm going to do the d'var torah from notes like I do in our Shabbat morning minyan, because I want more practice with that style of delivery and I'm hoping for good feedback. But the eulogy I have to write, which means I have to do it in time to get it printed on Friday. So tomorrow night, I guess.
Printing poses logistical challenges. They have a laptop connected to a printer and it's even on the network, but it's not visible from other machines on the network. (The printer itself is not set up as a shared resource.) No one seems to have a working USB hard drive, and we can't seem to get our various machines to see each other. I didn't have the presence of mind to install FTP on this laptop, and I'm not going to try to do it now. I'm currently thinking SSH + cut and paste + web server...
The school has copies of birkat ha-mazon (grace after meals). I'm pretty sure some text has been added since last year (before kakatuv), so there's unfamiliar melody. I led tonight (halfway through the week I can give this a try) and the student cantor was very helpful. I'd like a recording of the whole thing according to HUC nusach; it's a little different from what I'm used to.
All of the staff members this year are really great. One very nice thing: the student cantor, who was the advisor for our service group, wrote up individual feedback for each of us, in addition to what was said in the public discussion. I think that's great! No one did that last year. I don't know if the others are doing it too.
The Sh'liach K'hilah program has two summer sessions, so I'll be officially done this week though there are weekend retreats I plan to go to. I've been wondering what's next -- does the movement offer anything more for lay leaders (other than rabbinic school, I mean)? I asked Rabbi Joseph for his thoughts after his adult-ed class and he said "definitely do the Melton program". That's a two-year course of study (meets one night a week, I think) that has a local instance in Pittsburgh. I've heard of it but don't know a lot about it. Must investigate.
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Melton program