Shelley Lindauer
Opening Statement

Women’s groups have had a significant impact on congregational life for more than 100 years. Throughout our history, women have belied the stereotypical role of sisterhood as benefactor and preparer of the oneg. While meal preparation may be a responsibility some of our sisterhoods choose to take on, our women are involved in significant and life changing work in their synagogues and beyond. Sisterhoods have mentored and trained women to become transformational leaders within their congregation, who empower others and encourage innovation and change.

Rabbi Eric Yoffie, President of the Union for Reform Judaism, said at the 45th assembly of the Women of Reform Judaism (WRJ) in Houston, “If you need something done in congregational life, ask the women.”  Sisterhoods adjust their roles within congregational life based on community needs and societal changes. Our women recognize a need in our local communities, within the Movement and in the broader Jewish world. More importantly, they have the desire and drive to act on that need. 

Some of many responsibilities our women have assumed include social action and advocacy, with a focus on women’s and children’s issues; Torah study for women, including Rosh Chodesh groups and spiritual retreats; and leadership training, fundraising and youth activities. Sisterhoods offer a unique opportunity for women to join together to form friendships and explore shared goals and spirituality from a woman’s perspective.

The sense of a shared history, an almost indescribable commonality and understanding which transcends demographic agendas, is what creates the bonds that make our women’s groups so effective and so strong. We laugh together; we learn together; we make things happen together. Though some clergy have decided that single gender groups are not appropriate in our egalitarian congregations, the power of women coming together to effect change is evident in the accomplishments of sisterhoods over the past 94 years.

Together, our 500 sisterhoods and 75,000 women are even stronger. WRJ’s mission, by which our sisterhoods support the ideals and enhance the quality of Jewish living to ensure the future of progressive Judaism around the world, is practiced each and every day by sisterhoods. As a collective, our sisterhoods can accomplish what no sisterhood can do alone. 

Sisterhoods have been helping to educate our rabbinic students at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion since 1921.To date, WRJ is the largest cumulative donor to the College.

WRJ supports first year Israeli rabbinic students on the Jerusalem campus of HUC-JIR and gives assistance to rabbinic students around the world, who will be placed in World Union congregations in countries including the Former Soviet Union, Germany, South America, the Czech Republic and Australia. 

In September 2006, for the first time since the Nazi regime closed the rabbinical seminary in Berlin in 1942, Abraham Geiger College in Potsdam, Germany ordained three rabbis. Two students, Daniel Alter, a former teacher who will serve a congregation in Oldenburg, Germany, and Dr. Tom Kucera, an immigrant from the Czech Republic who will serve a liberal congregation in Munich, were supported throughout their rabbinic studies by Women of Reform Judaism.

WRJ, through the support of our sisterhoods, has funded many bricks and mortar projects: the dormitory on the campus in Cincinnati, still in use today; the library at Ben Shemen Children's Village in Israel; the purchase of the land at 838 Fifth Avenue in New York, which became the headquarters for the Union for Reform Judaism (then the Union of American Hebrew Congregations) 1951-1994; the Learning Center at Kibbutz Yahel; and a generous contribution to construct the World Education Centre in Jerusalem. In March, I will be traveling to Germany to dedicate the Women of Reform Judaism Music Library at the new School for Cantorial Arts, Abraham Geiger College.

Another not-to-be-forgotten accomplishment of the Women of Reform Judaism was the founding in 1939 of NFTY, the North American Federation of Temple Youth. Our women recognized the need to involve our youth in temple life and helped create programs to engage and support them.

Perhaps our most important accomplishment to date is also our most recent, the publication of The Torah: A Women’s Commentary. The response to this historic commentary, the work of more than 100 female biblical scholars, rabbis and philosophers—and entirely funded by Women of Reform Judaism—has far exceeded everyone’s expectations, and its impact on our Movement will be felt for generations. The task of interpreting the texts of Torah, once almost exclusively the province of men, has been changed forever by the voices and understandings of women in this monumental work.

The sisterhoods of Women of Reform Judaism have common goals and ideals, founded on the precepts of Torah, which unite us and give us the strength and passion to adapt and endure.

Doug Barden
Opening Statement

Unlike temple committees which have a narrowly defined purpose and which often pride themselves with their business-like meeting efficiency, local brotherhoods strive to be mass membership organizations, providing dozens, if not hundreds, of men the opportunity to get engaged in temple work. While the explicit mission of brotherhoods is often to provide a myriad of services to the entire co-ed temple community, they are not really successful unless they create something within their memberships themselves : a sense of "fellowship," dare I use the word, “brotherhood.”

They often don’t know it, but brotherhoods are engaged in serious and sorely needed “men’s work,” one of the unfinished parts of a genuine feminist movement that sought legitimately to eliminate the uneven distribution of power, leadership and recognition based upon gender, but whose goal was never to eliminate gender differences entirely.  

The short answer to why a brotherhood is unique (sisterhood excepted) within the temple community: For those who choose to get involved with brotherhood, it truly makes a lasting difference in their lives and in the lives of their family and entire temple community.

For the slightly longer answer, I turn to the men I have the honor and privilege to work closely with, my brotherhood members. Here is how just a few responded to the query: Why brotherhood?...

-- ... [I]t gives me the opportunity to serve my Temple & the Brotherhood by setting an example for my children by being involved in a Jewish sense.

-- I find my MRJ brothers providing sustenance and comfort. I take great comfort in our willingness to share openly with one another, in good and bad times. I find my relationship with my brothers as a supporting role in my primary relationships as a husband, father and grandfather. I would not change one thing about my MRJ experience and my relationship with each of my MRJ colleagues. This MRJ safe haven is much appreciated and helps me in my personal growth.

-- For me, Brotherhood is an important part of my Jewish journey. It has given me a chance to serve my temple from cooking and serving food, erecting and taking down the sukkah and the carnival booths at Chanukah and Purim, ushering at High Holy Days, packaging and mailing Yom HaShoah Candles, and planning and conducting Shabbatons and men’s interfaith programs. These were all centered around working, or being with other men. There is a comfort in being with other guys and a sense of camaraderie that does not happen in a mixed gender group. A Shabbaton with other men is a different experience from one with women....In my congregation, Brotherhood and Sisterhood comfortably hold gender specific events and gender inclusive, usually family events. The attendance at each demonstrates  there is a desire for both.

-- The importance of brotherhood really came out when my teenage daughter started having serious mental health issues. I had someone to turn to in a safe comforting environment….My brotherhood didn’t solve any of the problems, but they were there for me as a source of strength. I was able to share my emotions and receive their support in a way I would never have been able to do in a mixed gender environment. My wife had her close personal friends to provide support. I had my brotherhood. It means a tremendous amount to me that I can openly discuss my deep feelings with other men.  Gender lines are being blurred in many ways….I act differently with women and men. I love women and find it very easy to engage in conversation with women….But when it comes time to bare my soul, when it comes time for me to talk about my fears, my weaknesses, even my deepest regrets, I want to do it with my brothers, not my sisters.

Surprised by the depth and passion of the responses? Has brotherhood provided a unique opportunity that these men could not have found in the many co-ed venues a temple provides? Readers will have to decide for themselves.

Does anyone seriously believe that such men’s-only experiences undermine our Movement’s commitment to creating a gender egalitarian environment in our sanctuaries, board rooms and social halls?  It is exactly because some men have the opportunity to experience men’s-only space occasionally that they are better prepared, more willing to participate in the larger, co-ed temple community.

We often tell our local affiliates they can not operate like their father’s or grandfather’s brotherhood. But that underlying need for fellowship has not gone away. Rather than to deny men such opportunities in our congregations, we should seek to nurture this bond of brothers, thereby creating a stronger Reform Jewish community for us all.