Menu

Get to know the volunteers, supporters and leaders that make Jewish St. Paul a great place to live

Leadership Development Through Shared Values

Sara Rice remembers nervously walking into her first Harry Kay Leadership Institute (HKLI) meeting. Just 30 minutes later, she said to herself, “I just found 39 new friends.” Sara quickly recognized that she and her peers shared similar values and wanted to work for the community’s betterment. “The program gave me a good sense of what the Jewish ecosystem in the Twin Cities looks like and how vibrant our Jewish community really is,” she said.

 

Sara is part of Cohort 10 of HKLI, the two-year program for developing and training Jewish leaders. Sponsored by the St. Paul and Minneapolis Jewish Federations and the Harry Kay Foundation, HKLI has trained 350 participants, many of whom now serve in leadership positions across the Jewish community.

Rabbi Morris Allen:  In Support of Federated Giving

 

Tishri 5782/September 2021
Dear Fellow St. Paulites,
 
I want to take this opportunity to wish you all a Shana Tova, a good and healthy and fully vaccinated year. I hope the beginning of this new year has been filled with blessings. God-willing, we will be sealed in the Book of Life for yet another year.  
 
In September 1986, shortly after Phyllis and I came to St. Paul to lead Beth Jacob Congregation forward, I received a call from Rabbi Leigh Lerner, then the senior rabbi at Mount Zion.  He asked if he could visit with me. Thinking it was about providing hizuk (strength) to a young colleague about to lead his first High Holiday services in a new congregation, I readily said yes.  He did provide hizuk, but he also let me know what it meant to be a part of the St. Paul Jewish community. 

Read more

Rick Linsk, St. Paul Jewish Federation President

 

Remarks by Rick Linsk at Federation’s 85th Annual Meeting
I want to spend a few minutes considering a question and looking forward a bit. First the question: Why are we here?
 

I don’t mean why are we all here together tonight on yet another Zoom call. But why are we here as participants in a Jewish community?

 

I suggest it’s because our project, the essence of what we do, starts with seeing each person as created in the divine image. Because we believe this, it shapes everything we do. It sparks our commitment to chai, to life itself. 

Read more

World ORT Helps Students Find their Future

 

David Fhima recalls that he was headed down a rough road in his early years until a school run by World ORT, the global education network driven by Jewish values, gave him the direction to choose another path.

"I was a vagabond being kicked out from boarding schools until ORT Strasbourg accepted me and turned my life around,” said David. “I was in my early teens, and the director of the school, Monsieur Loeve, was a concentration camp survivor who instilled the fear of God in me and helped me turn my life around. They also got me a full scholarship at EIG (Ecole d'ingénieurs de Genève) to become an engineer."

Read more