The World Beyond

TIKKUN OLAM

WHAT IS TIKKUN OLAM?

The simplest translation of tikkun olam is: to repair the world.

Other definitions:

WHAT ARE WE DOING TO EXPRESS TIKKUN OLAM? HOW CAN YOU HELP?

United Israel Appeal

On October 23rd the Peterborough Jewish Community had its anuual UIA Kickoff at Erica Cherney's home. The speaker was Meir Javedanfar. Here is biography of this fascinating individual:

Middle East Analyst is a subsidiary of The Middle East Economic and Political Analysis Company, and is established and run by Meir Javedanfar MA, Msc.

Meir Javedanfar (right) has been described as “a respected, Iranian-born writer and analyst specializing in Israeli-Iranian relations” by TIME magazine; a prominent Iranian-Israeli analyst by The Daily Telegraph; “one of the best informed observers” by Asia Times; and as “one of the most objective analysts” by Negarkha, a leading reformist news blog based in Iran.

Mr. Javedanfar is multilingual. He speaks Farsi, Hebrew, English, Spanish and Portuguese. He has been consulted in all of the aforementioned languages by numerous media organizations including CNN, FOX News, BBC, The New York Times and others. He has also lectured at numerous universities and conferences, such as George Washington University, Foreign Affairs Symposium of University of Baltimore, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv University and conferences in Brazil, Nigeria, Spain and Italy.

Links to some recent articles by Meir:

Fairview United Church Roof Appeal

Our president, Larry Gillman reports that the Beth Israel community has received the letter below from a good friend of the Beth Israel, the Reverend Bill Peacock of Fairview United Church on the centre line of Smith Township. Their church has suffered some damage and the roof has been blown off, so they are fund raising events to help this small community repair the damage. If you can help, please contact Jean Brown at the number indicated below and if you love that country kind of music, you’ll want to take in the fundraiser concert at Knox United on November 20th featuring some of the areas top musicians. Reverend Peacock writes:

"As most of you will know by now, the little country church where I've been the minister for the last 25 years was quite devastated by the storm of June 8th. The cost of repairs are in excess of $100,000 ... thank goodness for insurance. Here's the catch. Insurance doesn't cover the HST so that leaves us with an outstanding balance of over $15,000. Because we are a charitable organisation, we are able to get a partial rebate sometime in the future. Yup ... so, we've borrowed $15,500 from the national church and know that eventually we will be able to recover approximately $10,000 of this amount. The remaining balance is left to this little 135 year old church and a rather small congregation. At the time, many asked what they could do to help. Truly, there wasn't much people could do, more tearing down had to occur by the professionals before reconstruction could occur.

As a first step, we have a "Musical Benefit Fund Raiser" to be held at Knox United Church (Rubidge/Wolfe/Reid Streets ... north east corner of CGE) on Sunday November 20th at 2:00 in the afternoon. The concert should last about two hours. The cost of tickets is a minimum $10. The music is provided by two bands "Wes Lee and the Woodland Express" and "Gerry Guyatt and Second Wind" the style of music is from the 50's and 60's with a country flavour. There are two "special guests" that would be the Mayor, Daryl Bennett and me ...

So how can you help? Buy a ticket! If someone wanted to make a donation instead of attending the concert the full amount of the ticket could be received as a taxable donation, the church would then issue you a tax receiptfor the full amount. If you wished to come to the concert but felt you could pay more than the ten dollars, we would issue tax receipts for the amount above the ten dollar ticket price, for instance, a twenty dollar purchased ticket would include a ten dollar tax receipt. You can get a ticket from myself or by calling Jean Brown at 705 742 1328.

How else can you help? You may know a place where you could put up a small colour poster (sample attached as a pdf file) ... we've had posters printed up and would be delighted to provide you with posters, please let me know how many you would like, also, if you could let me know where you were planning on putting up the poster, that too would be helpful as I'm trying to track where the posters are located. How else? You could let others know ... I'm sending this note to a relatively small number of people that I believe wouldn't feel that I'm just filling up theiremail inbox. If there are friends/associates you might also think would beinterested that would be great. Thanks in advance for your support and kind thoughts."

Relief for The Young Israel Synagogue of Chomedey

This synagogue located in Laval, Quebec (1025 Elizabeth Blvd) was recently (Oct. 2010) devastated by a 'prank' that has caused at least $65,000 worth of damage to the building, possibly up to $100,000. Read more about YIS' plight in the Canadian Jewish News. Please help if you can. Beth Israel Synagogue has tried to do so.

Canada World Youth

For the past 3 months (Sept.- Dec. 2010) we have had a Canada World Youth initiative in our community. This involved the Canada World Youth organization, which included 9 young Tanzanians plus 9 Canadians, who were paired with 9 host families. The idea of Canada World Youth is to provide a meaningful cultural exchange while helping to develop leadership and other skills of the participants. The exchanged ended on Dec. 8th with the 18 participants leaving for a 3 moth exchange in Tanzania.

The 9 Tanzanians are all volunteers at the Chamazi orphanage in Tanzania, at which the Canadians will also volunteer during the next 3 months. Chamazi is the home for over 200 orphans, and has very limited supplies and resources as Tanzania is also a poor country.

Canada World Youth approached us to help them organize a fundraiser for the orphanage, and we also provided the shul for the event. We are pleased to report that 100 people attended the event, and $3,500 was raised for the orphanage. The leaders of Canada World Youth are meeting with the leaders of the orphanage to define the best use of the funds. This will make a tremendous difference to the quality of life of the orphans. Visit the Canada World Youth web site to learn more about their programs and initiatives.

Volunteer to Assist Jewish Inmates Through their Journey

One of the greatest mitzvahs we can perform is to help others who have strayed from their path in life by providing them with the support and the knowledge that someone cares. With this in mind our Rabbi, Shalom Schachter was recently approach by Laila Clein Friedman, the Coordinator of Chaplaincy Services & Jewish Healing Program with a mitzvah opportunity for our community.

There are a number of Jewish inmates at the Lindsay Correctional Facility who value their connection with Judaism, but have limited opportunity for exposure. The Chaplaincy Services & Jewish Healing Program visits them periodically however due to a shortage of resources, these inmates do not receive a Jewish connection on a consistent basis.

The idea is to have a group of volunteers from the Peterborough Jewish community who could share visits on a rotating basis. This way we could support their need for a Jewish connection, without excessively burdening any single volunteer from our community. The following is some information from Laila that will help to paint a picture of the need, and how we as a community can help to fulfill this mitzvah:

"We would ideally like to have volunteers visit Central East Correctional in Lindsay on a weekly or biweekly basis. Visiting at CECC is only permitted on specific days and times. 9-11 am, 1-4 pm, and possibly a couple of hours in the evening. I would not expect a volunteer to spend more than 1-2 hours there at any point in time. The number of inmates there can vary from week to week. Last time I visited, there were 9 names on my list of Jewish inmates, and I was able to see 6 of them." "The inmates I meet at CECC over the last 5 years, are always so pleased to have a visitor, someone who wants nothing from them, and expects nothing from them. Just a friendly face who is there on behalf of the Jewish community to let them know that we, as a community, have not forgotten or abandoned them. That we are not judging them - we are there to give them chizuk and support them in their journey." "If there are questions relating to Jewish ritual supervision, the volunteer should speak to the head of chaplaincy - Rev. Wayne Moore, who will contact Rabbi Ronald Weiss, the Director of Chaplaincy for direction."

If we can find just 4 volunteers and as a community we were to send a visitor every 2 weeks, each volunteer would only need to be there once every 2 months. Those interested should contact Larry Gillman.

Contributing to an Interfaith effort to provide meals to the homeless and low income

...St John's Anglican church puts on a lunch for homeless and low income people every Saturday. It starts at 11:30 am and goes until everyone is fed. They have between 100 and 120 people attend this lunch each week. There are 2 ways that individuals in our community can support this initiative. These are:

  • Preparing Food - you can prepare a dish at your home and bring it to the church the day before or the day of the lunch. There is no particular request for vegetarian food, and as a matter of fact most of the people who attend prefer meat dishes;
  • Serving and Kitchen Helpl - you can help in the kitchen and to serve on the day. The food is served buffet style.
Those who can help please contact Larry Gillman or call 872-2990.

Howard Hospital in Zimbabwe

...AIDS and health care relief. Individuals and groups in Peterborough contribute to the African AIDS Support efforts to provide immediate and long term solutions. Ve'ahavta has been working in this capacity for many years.

Contributing to Haiti Relief

...to try and overcome this human tragedy. See below: Human Tragedy in Haiti to see how you can help.

Community Centre

...retrofitting the synagogue with the assistance of an Ontario Trillium Foundation grant so the synagogue is accessibile to everyone for community events.

Multifaith Participant

...participating fully in local multifaith events. Click link: Abraham Festival.

AIDS in Africa

...supporting the efforts of organizations such as Ve'ahavta and African AIDS Support of the Kawarthas(AASK) that seek to provide immediate and long term solutions.

Holocaust Education

...providing a regular forum for presentations and discussions for Holocaust awareness ( Holocaust Education Week ; UJA Federation of Greater Toronto )

...providing a forum RJCO (Regional Jewish Congregations of Ontario events.

...soon to be providing a small scale circulation of books from our library.

...providing Holocaust awareness building through our website. CLICK link here: Holocaust.

THE JEWISH AND ISRAELI WORLDIn Israel

We are determined to stay informed about issues that affect Jews and others around the world and especially in Israel. Look to this space for links to interesting web sites.

News:

Click the links below:

Action Alerts (CUPE) by the CJC. To find out what you can do click HERE.

The Jerusalem Post offers up-to-date news from Israel .

Ynet, the site that Israelis use to keep up with information.

The Canadian Jewish News offers information about the world and Canada .

Parshot Updates:

Kolel offers discussions for the weekly parshot

Pardes from Jerusalem allows you to download the weekly lecture on the parsha.

Arts and Culture:

Catch up on Israeli music at a site from New Brunswick. Can't be? Well this is from New Brunswick, New Jersey, home of Rutgers University. The Israel Hour has a music archive where you can catch up on past shows.

Podcasts of modern Israeli music and traditional Jewish music is available at Kol Cambridge. You can either download to an MP3 player or sample from your computer.

Canadian Jewish Congress is the umbrella agency for many branches of activity in Canada .

The Toronto Jewish Film Festival occurs in May every year. However the web site is worth monitoring because special films are shown during the year as well.

The Vancouver Holocaust Museum offers a virtual exhibit on Canada 's Immigration History. "Least desired were Asians, Blacks and Jews"

The Jewish Food Archives is not a flashy site but it contains many recipes for holidays and every day.