Message from the CEO
By: Larry Yudelson
Source: jewishinsandiego.org

Michael Jeser, now CEO of Jewish Federation/San Diego, shared this thought piece featuring Rabbi Lori’s innovative work from when she was the rabbi at USC Hillel.  Ten years later, he reflects on her innovations…

Kids these (high holy) days…
By: Larry Yudelson
Source: timesofisrael.com

WSJ article that included Goat Yoga at Open Temple went viral with all sides chiming in.  Here’s the latest commentary from timesofisrael.com…

NYT, WaPo Champion Leftist High Holiday Jewish Services, Including Goat Yoga And Black Lives Matter Discussions
By: Ben Shapiro
Source: Daily Wire

Ben Shapiro 2020 cross referenced Open Temple Goat Yoga in the Daily Wire as well as the National Review. Ben, “for reals”, we invite you to experience Open Temple. We are NOT political and focus rather on the role of ritual life and Torah in the 21st Century.  #DailyWire #OpenTemple #SpiritualbutNotPolitical #VeniceLove

Goat Yoga is a Poor Substitute for Religious Observance
By: Ben Shapiro
Source: National Review

Conservative political commentator @BenShapiro responded to the WSJ article about outreach to a new generation (and Goat Yoga Avodah on Yom Kippur) in the National Review. A Los Angelean, he is officially invited to Open Temple’s “Shabbat Take Me Higher” to experience our love of Torah. Hey, Ben, stay in our guest house in Venice with your family for Shabbat, and I’ll invite David Suissa over as well and the three of us can daven at PJC for Shacharit together. B’Emet and with love, Rabbi Lori Shapiro

Goat Yoga, Mosh Pits, Glow Sticks: Younger Jews Reinvent Yom Kippur
By: Shayndi Raice
Source: Wall Street Journal

For 2,000 years, Jews have spent Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, in a synagogue abstaining from food and drink, fervently praying and beseeching God to forgive their sins.
This year, some rabbis, eager to woo younger people to High Holiday services, are holding programs in a beer garden, replacing deep reverential bows with Goat Yoga…

TABLE FOR FIVE: Chukat

Opening Hearts, Minds and a Temple

“We’re in. Are You?”

In Spring 2018, five speakers selected from the Collaboratory Network–Gamal Palmer, Carine Warsawski, Rabbi Lori Shapiro, Dr. Sharon Weiss-Greenberg, and Arya Marvazy–worked with ELI Talks to hone and effectively present their own stories of risk-taking at a storytelling event for the May 2018 gathering. This event set a tone of vulnerability and connected a room full of Jewish innovators to the ways in which all of us live out the gathering’s theme of risk-taking in our personal and professional lives.

Source: California Apparel News

By: Dorothy Crouch – Thursday, March 1, 2018

As a doctor and lawyer with degrees from Stanford University, the University of California at Berkeley and Yale, Julie Cantor doesn’t seem to be a likely candidate to be designing handbags. It is, however, her work as an attorney that led Cantor to develop Harlen, a luxury collection tailored to the needs of career-minded women…