The Vermont Choral Union (VCU), under the direction of Eric Milnes, presents a collection of choral works from the Jewish tradition, featuring composers such as Salamone Rossi, Louis Lewandowski, Emanuel Kirshner, and Max Janowski. Often overlooked by contemporary audiences, these works illuminate our historical understanding and provide a new context for our present.
The program culminates with Leonard Bernstein’s iconic Chichester Psalms. VCU is excited to share this much-beloved choral masterwork with Burlington audiences. Assistant Director Cole Marino directs Bernstein’s rarely-heard chamber orchestration, featuring some of Vermont’s great instrumental performers. Complementing the first portion of the program, Bernstein’s composition highlights the influence of the Jewish tradition on both his compositional style and the broader choral repertoire.

These performances promise to entertain, enlighten, and engage audiences, and the Vermont Choral Union looks forward to seeing you there!

The Vermont Choral Union (VCU), under the direction of Eric Milnes, presents a collection of choral works from the Jewish tradition, featuring composers such as Salamone Rossi, Louis Lewandowski, Emanuel Kirshner, and Max Janowski. Often overlooked by contemporary audiences, these works illuminate our historical understanding and provide a new context for our present.
The program culminates with Leonard Bernstein’s iconic Chichester Psalms. VCU is excited to share this much-beloved choral masterwork with Burlington audiences. Assistant Director Cole Marino directs Bernstein’s rarely-heard chamber orchestration, featuring some of Vermont’s great instrumental performers. Complementing the first portion of the program, Bernstein’s composition highlights the influence of the Jewish tradition on both his compositional style and the broader choral repertoire.

These performances promise to entertain, enlighten, and engage audiences, and the Vermont Choral Union looks forward to seeing you there!

Yizkor and Shabbat Morning Worship 

In the sanctuary and on Zoom with Rabbi Haigh.

Yizkor Link to Zoom

Join us in person or on Zoom as we celebrate the blessing of the “first fruits” and our youngest Shir Shalom members. Please bring the first cuttings from your garden. In keeping with the holiday and the tradition of eating dairy on Shavuot, please bring something to share.

Shavuot Zoom Link

Join Temple Sinai in re-enacting the march of our Torah from our temporary home at Faith Methodist on Dorset St to our permanent home at 500 Swift St.

Join us for a special service and oneg at 500 Swift St to follow.

All are welcome and encouraged to attend.

This is the first complete English-language translation of a classic of Yiddish literature, one of the great comic novels of the twentieth century. The Zelmenyaners describes the travails of a Jewish family in Minsk that is torn asunder by the new Soviet reality. Four generations are depicted in riveting and often uproarious detail as they face the profound changes brought on by the demands of the Soviet regime and its collectivist, radical secularism. The resultant inter-generational showdowns—including disputes over the introduction of electricity, radio, and electric trolley—are rendered with humor, pathos, and a finely controlled satiric pen. Moyshe Kulbak, a contemporary of the Soviet Jewish writer Isaac Babel, picks up where Sholem Aleichem left off a generation before, exploring in this book the transformation of Jewish life.

Not yet a member of the Doris Bass Book Club? Click here to register!

Third in a four part Sunday Series:

Please join us for International Folk Dancing at the RJC. Come and dance, or you can enjoy sitting and watching. Please bring clean, dry shoes for dancing.

For more information, please get in touch with Judy.

The next Creating Spiritual Journeys session entitled, Building a Sacred Relationship with the Divine will be on Sunday, May 17, 10:30-12:30.  This workshop combines an exploration of Jewish sources with partners (Hevruta) and group discussion, followed by making our own art as a response to what we learned. For those who really don't want to make art, you can creatively express yourself through writing. Register here.

Come and try it out! For those who need financial help, please contact Rabbi Tobie. 

Join us for a discussion of "The Book of Israela" by CBE Rabbinic Team Member, Rabbi Rena Blumenthal. In person, in the Social Hall.

ABOUT THE BOOK:

Jerusalem, 2002: the height of the sec­ond intifa­da. Kobi Bena­mi is a mid­dle-aged psy­chol­o­gist whose life is in sham­bles. His wife has thrown him out for casu­al phi­lan­der­ing; his daugh­ter won’t speak to him; and he may lose his job due to indif­fer­ent work habits. At this des­per­ate junc­ture, Kobi gets a new patient, Israela, whose sto­ry is full of uncan­ny Bib­li­cal ref­er­ences, and whose pow­er­ful enig­mat­ic hus­band Y may or may not exist. Israela hasn’t seen Y in months, but she is being stalked by his prophet-like emis­saries, span­ning the spec­trum of Israeli soci­ety — Ortho­dox to sec­u­lar, right-wing set­tlers to left-wing urban elites — unit­ed only in their harsh con­dem­na­tion of Israel, a fierce devo­tion to Y, and con­nec­tion to The Out­stretched Arm, a sin­is­ter orga­ni­za­tion pur­port­ed to be run by Y.

As Kobi becomes ensnared in a sur­re­al encounter with anthro­po­mor­phized ancient Israel, and pre­oc­cu­pied with ques­tions about the nature and exis­tence of Y, he is forced to con­front his dys­func­tion­al life pat­terns, his family’s trag­ic past, and the end­less war that rages around him.

On Zoom by registration.

Choose from pre arranged mitzvah projects including helping sort donations at Listen, playing music for and games with folks at a nursing home, making meals for the Haven, making dog and cat toys for the Humane Society, cleaning the UVJC cemetery gravestones, and more.

Please click HERE for details.

Tot Shabbat on May 16, at the Roth Center (10:30-11:30), suitable for families with children ages birth to 6 years

Shabbat Dinner for Young Families on May 15th at 5:30pm. Temple Sinai will provide pizza, challah, and drinks. Please consider bringing a (vegetarian) side dish to share.

We will light candles, bless the challah and juice and eat together. We will also have a few fun Shabbat songs and toys to play with while adults finish up their own dinners.

If your child can stay up late enough, please join us for a Kabbalat Shabbat service starting at 6:30pm

Contact Aimee Hutton at aimee.hutton@templesinaivt.org for more details

Discover a New Side of Israel --

The Past, Present, and Future of Israeli Conservation
Wednesday, May 13, 7:00pm
In person and on Zoom

Join Jay Shofet, seasoned activist and member of the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel (SPNI), as he paints a vibrant picture of Israel as seasonal sanctuary for millions of birds, and explains how this migration fly route serves as a keystone for global environmental resilience. We will explore Israel's transformation from technological innovator to global environmental trailblazer, and explore the question of: How is a tiny global diversity hotspot rebounding after war and wildfires, and how can nature heal a traumatized nation? You'll learn about pioneering efforts to restore Israel's lost swamps, challenge myths about the century-long journey of Israeli tree-planting and how Israel is becoming a green beacon to the world.

All Jewish identified adults to explore our feelings and reactions to the tensions in Israel/ Palestine today. We will use Jewish values, and Jewish and Palestinian writings as a basis for holding courageous conversations together. Coffee and goodies included.

These 5 conversations will build on each other. Come to as many as you can. In person at Ohavi Zedek, monthly on Sunday mornings. Please register so we can send you materials ahead of each session.

Sundays from 9:15 – 11:00 in the OZ Sanctuary & Social Hall

Click to Register