On Sunday, Jan. 8, Or Emet member Rachel Wexelbaum will present “In the Spirit of Harvey Milk: 2022-2023 Humanistic Jewish Role Model of the Year” from 10 a.m.-noon at the Talmud Torah of St. Paul, 768 Hamline Ave. South in St. Paul. A social time will follow the program. Those who cannot attend in person may join over Zoom. Please register in advance here. 

Harvey Milk

The Society for Humanistic Judaism has selected the late Harvey Milk as the 2022-2023 Humanistic Jewish Role Model of the Year. The choice of Milk has generated controversy among the Humanistic Jewish community, as Milk neither identified as a Humanistic Jew nor affiliated himself with any religious organization. Wexelbaum will demonstrate how Milk embodied Humanistic Jewish values while uplifting some contemporary LGBTQ+ Jewish activists who are equally worthy of the award.

Wexelbaum is an independent writer and researcher who focuses on LGBTQ+ and Jewish identities, histories and community building via cultural preservation, activism and Wikimedia projects. With more than 20 years’ experience as an educator, librarian and human rights advocate, she currently works as the education director at the St. Cloud Correctional Facility of the Minnesota Department of Corrections.

The Sunday adult programs are free and open to the public and meet concurrently with the Jewish Cultural Sunday School. All in-person attendees must wear a mask indoors and are expected to be up to date on vaccinations or have a same-day negative COVID test.

Or Emet is a secular congregation celebrating and honoring Jewish culture, history and values from a humanistic, inclusive perspective. 

For information about Or Emet’s Jewish Cultural Sunday School, contact JCSS director Molly Phipps at school-1@oremet.org. For information about Or Emet, email info@oremet.org or visit oremet.org.

On Sunday, Dec. 11, Or Emet will host a presentation by Judson (Kim) Bemis, founder and executive director of Gobi Support Inc., an online drug and alcohol early intervention program for teens and their families.

Judson (Kim) Bemis

The program will run from 10 a.m.-noon at the Talmud Torah of St. Paul, 768 Hamline Ave. South in St. Paul. A social time will follow the program. Those who cannot attend in person may join over Zoom. Please register in advance here. 

Marijuana legalization is a hot topic today. Bemis will talk about his personal struggle with cannabis use disorder, what Minnesota just legalized and why commercializing cannabis may not be the solution.

Bemis began his work in the field of addiction recovery in 2005, first as national director of development for the Hazelden Foundation and then as executive director of Hazelden’s online business opportunities. He has served on more than a dozen for-profit and nonprofit boards and currently serves as co-chair of Smart Approaches to Marijuana Minnesota.

The Sunday adult programs are free and open to the public and meet concurrently with the Jewish Cultural Sunday School. All attendees must wear a mask indoors and are expected to be up to date on vaccinations or have a same-day negative COVID test.

Or Emet is a secular congregation celebrating and honoring Jewish culture, history and values from a humanistic, inclusive perspective. 

For information about Or Emet’s Jewish Cultural Sunday School, contact JCSS director Molly Phipps at school-1@oremet.org. For information about Or Emet, email info@oremet.org or visit oremet.org.

On Saturday, Dec. 3, from 10-11:30 a.m., Or Emet will host a Shabbat service followed by a presentation titled “Rod Serling: The Art and Philosophy of a Humanist.” The events will take place at the Minnesota JCC Sabes Center Minneapolis, 4330 S. Cedar Lake Road, Minneapolis. A social time will follow the program.

Rod Serling

The service will be led by Eva Cohen, Or Emet’s ritual leader and a Humanistic rabbi-in-training. Following the service, Or Emet member Diane Wanner will discuss Rod Serling, an American scriptwriter, television producer, radio host and narrator who publicly stated that it was the duty of writers to explore relevant and socially significant content in their work. 

Serling was born to Jewish parents, became a Unitarian and wove his humanistic philosophy throughout his work, including the well-known television series “The Twilight Zone.” Wanner’s presentation will examine the moral and political themes of Serling’s fiction. 

Those who cannot attend in person may join over Zoom. Please register in advance here. In-person attendees must wear a mask indoors and are expected to be up to date on vaccinations or have a same-day negative COVID test.

Or Emet’s events and programs may change per CDC and state guidelines during the pandemic. All updates and changes will be posted in Or Emet’s events calendar. Or Emet is a secular congregation celebrating and honoring Jewish culture, history and values from a humanistic, inclusive perspective. For more information about Or Emet, email info@oremet.org or visit oremet.org.

On Friday, Nov. 18, from 7:30-9 p.m., Or Emet will host a Shabbat service followed by a program titled “Youth in Government and the Model U.N. Programs: Setting the Stage for Civic Engagement.” The evening’s events will take place at the Minnesota JCC Sabes Center Minneapolis, 4330 S. Cedar Lake Road, Minneapolis. A social time will follow the program.

Students from the YMCA Center for Youth Voice in Minneapolis will speak about the Youth in Government and Model U.N. programs.

The service will be led by Eva Cohen, Or Emet’s ritual leader and a Humanistic rabbi-in-training. Following the service, students from the YMCA Center for Youth Voice in Minneapolis will talk about the Youth in Government (YIG) and Model U.N. (MUN) programs. Michael Wall, outreach manager for the Center for Youth Voice, will be in attendance as well.

YIG and MUN are opportunities for secondary students to learn how state and world governments work, improve presentation skills, master persuasion and compromise, and meet students from around the state. Participants in the programs are better prepared and inspired to advocate for changes in issues and policies that matter to them. 

Those who cannot attend in person may join over Zoom. Please register in advance here. In-person attendees must wear a mask indoors and are expected to be up to date on vaccinations or have a same-day negative COVID test.

Or Emet’s events and programs may change per CDC and state guidelines during the pandemic. All updates and changes will be posted in Or Emet’s events calendar. Or Emet is a secular congregation celebrating and honoring Jewish culture, history and values from a humanistic, inclusive perspective. For more information about Or Emet, email info@oremet.org or visit oremet.org.

On Sunday, Nov. 13, Or Emet members Michal Moskow and Scott Chazdon will present “Illuminating Darkness: Visitor Experiences at Dark Tourism Sites” from 10 a.m.-noon at the Talmud Torah of St. Paul, 768 Hamline Ave. South in St. Paul. A social time will follow the program. 

Those who cannot attend in person may join over Zoom. Please register in advance here. 

The site of the police killing of George Floyd in South Minneapolis. (Photo credit: Scott Chazdon)

Dark tourism is defined as visits to places where traumatic events have occurred, and it can be informative, personally meaningful or emotionally healing. But dark tourism can send distorted or inauthentic messages about the past. For this reason, thoughtful curation of dark tourism experiences is crucial. 

This presentation will explore and contrast visitor experiences from three dark tourism sites: a site in Mankato, Minnesota, of a mass lynching of 38 Dakota Indians in 1862, Holocaust sites in Germany and Eastern Europe in the 1930s and 1940s, and the site of the police killing of George Floyd in South Minneapolis. 

Moskow is a professor emerita at Metropolitan State University who also is rostered at the University of Gothenburg. Her major areas include social linguistics and human rights. Chazdon is a sociologist and program evaluator for University of Minnesota Extension. He served as president of Or Emet from 2018-2021.

The Sunday adult programs are free and open to the public and meet concurrently with the Jewish Cultural Sunday School. All attendees must wear a mask indoors and are expected to be up to date on vaccinations or have a same-day negative COVID test.

Or Emet is a secular congregation celebrating and honoring Jewish culture, history and values from a humanistic, inclusive perspective.

For information about Or Emet’s Jewish Cultural Sunday School, contact JCSS director Molly Phipps at school-1@oremet.org. For information about Or Emet, email info@oremet.org or visit oremet.org.