Progressives prepare to mark milestones
THE Union for Progressive Judiasm has unveiled plans for the celebration of a series of landmark anniversaries next year.
PETER KOHN
THE Union for Progressive Judiasm (UJP) has unveiled plans for the celebration of a series of landmark anniversaries next year.
Among the milestones the movement will be commemorating in 2010 are 80 years of Progressive Judaism in the region, 80 years since the founding of St Kilda’s Temple Beth Israel, 60 years of the Leo Baeck Centre in Melbourne, 50 years of Sydney’s North Shore Temple Emanuel, 30 years of Temple Shalom on the Gold Coast, 25 years of Progressive worship in Canberra and, a bit further afield, “the 21st” of Hong Kong’s United Jewish Congregation.
The plans were one of the items addressed at the UPJ six-monthly gathering in Sydney earlier this month.
According to the movement’s executive director, Steve Denenberg, events will combine prayer, study and celebration throughout the region, including numerous scholars-in-residence, cantors, entertainers and visitors.
“The leadership of the World Union for Progressive Judaism will be joining our biennial conference in Canberra in November 2010,” he told The AJN.
The UPJ gathering, one of a series that supplements the movement’s biennial conferences, drew presidents, rabbis, shaliachs and executive committee members from across Australia, New Zealand and Asia.
Special guest at the event was Naomi Abelson, coordinator of Nothing but Nets -— a North American Union for Reform Judaism program sponsored by the United Nations Foundation -— which seeks to eradicate malaria in Africa.
Speakers at the gathering included Executive Council of Australian Jewry executive director Peter Wertheim, Shalom Institute head Dr Hilton Immerman and Zionist Federation of Australia technology specialist Andre Oboler.