New Mexico’s state bird, the Roadrunner, in Fort Stockton, Texas Dear Friends:“I’m not religious – I hardly ever go to synagogue.”  “I not really Jewish – I’m more of an atheist.”  I’ve heard people make those statements, but too often,…

I’m happiest when I’m surrounded by books! Dear Friends:I like reading even more than I like eating chocolate! Well, maybe that’s an exaggeration.  But if you’ve read one of my quarterly messages before, you probably won’t be surprised by my…

Adat Israel, Guatemala City Dear Friends:One of the luxuries of not making my living as a rabbi is that I don’t deliver very many sermons.  (I suspect this is viewed as a great benefit by my congregants as well).  In…

Los Alamos Community Seder at “Pig and Fig” Restaurant in White Rock, New Mexico. Photo courtesy Carol A Clark/ladailypost.com Dear Friends:As I write this quarterly message, I’m recuperating from leading successive community Seders in Santa Fe for HaMakom and Los…

Dear Friends:  In the opening words of an oft-cited poem by Rabbi Alvin Fine, “Birth is a beginning, and death a destination, and life is a journey.” Using that image, I believe that Judaism can provide us with unique markers…

Dear Friends:Recently I have fallen into a modest exercise routine which involves racking up steps on my pedometer most mornings while listening to classical music; truth be told, as an avid indoorsman, I am usually marching around in my basement.…

Dear Friends:According to the book Hebrew Ethical Wills, selected and edited by Israel Abrahams, there is a beautiful custom dating back millennia for Jews to compose testamentary directions for the religious and secular guidance of their children.  In Abrahams’ anthology,…

Dear Friends: When I was a kid, I enjoyed watching cartoons. The sign off for Looney Tunes (That’s All, Folks) meant time to go back to something more productive than television, and I was never terribly happy about that. Endings…

Rabbi Jack with Lindsey and Zachary under the chuppah Dear Friends:This being another in a series of quarterly missives from a physics rabbi, I’d like to share with you a few thoughts about relationships, mostly from a Jewish perspective (don’t…

Dear Friends:“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the…