It’s Pride Month, and for Jews around the country — and around the world, it’s the time of year that has become traditional over the last couple of decades to celebrate a Pride Seder or a special Pride Shabbat.
This weekend in New York City there are a number of Queer Jewish Pride events. At Congregation Rodeph Shalom on the Upper West Side there is a dinner following Friday night services with Judy Gold as the Guest of Honor, you can register on the JCC site, or at this date best to call 646-505-5708.
At the Village Temple, the Pride Shabbat d’var will be given by Gabriel Blau on this weeks Torah reading, and titled "Building Open Tents, The Jewish Journey and Civil Rights." I’d like to be at both of these events, but this weekend I’ll be at NewFest, where I’ve marked out about 22 films I want to see — which means I will probably see about 15.
Meanwhile, the Temple for Universal Judaism is screening the film Hineini, a documentary about a young woman coming out in a Jewish high school, following services.
New Jersey won’t be left out — after all, they’re ahead of New York state in partnership rights for same-gender couples. And at B’nai Keshet, a Reconstructionist congregation, there will be a Pride Seder tied to the cause of marriage equality (which was the focus of the last seder at Congregation B’nai Jeshurun). And speaking of marriage equality, there is a great posting on the Jewish case for marriage equality from Australia (where pride seders have been celebrated as well).
Next weekend, down in Miami, at Temple Israel of Greater Miami, there will be a Pride Seder. I am always thrilled when I read about Pride Seders, since we started doing them at Congregation B’nai Jeshurun in 1995, based on the liturgy developed by the Queer Minyan in Berkeley. We expanded the text and added a number of rituals, calling it the Stonewall Seder. And over the years, as the text was picked up at other synagogues with additions and edits, we revised our text to reflect what we liked that we saw elsewhere. I wish there were one place where all the texts were collected so that someone could study the evolution of this new tradition.
Also next weekend in Boston, what is perhaps the oldest Pride Seder in the country will be held at Temple Sinai, and is sponsored by Congregation Am Tikva, CJP GLBT Team, Keshet, Ohel Tzedek of Temple Israel, and the Interfaith Coalition for Transgender Equality.
The text of the Stonewall Seder (which can be downloaded here) was particularly influenced by revisions made by Andrew Ramer and Joss Eldridge at Congregation Sha’ar ZaHav, which this year will be holding their seder on Saturday, June 20, 2009, 6:00 pm. And for those of you who can’t go to a seder, you can see clips from the last Stonewall Seder at B’nai Jeshurun on YouTube, with the complete speech given by the guest of honor, Lisa Kron, and selection from the readings over the course of the night. My favorites include readings about the objects on the seder plate and a very different set of four questions:
And speaking of video clips, also at the JCC in NYC later this month is the Feigele Film Festival, with some great movies about queer life in Israel, including Veahavta—And Thou Shalt Love, Winner of the coveted Wolgin Prize for Best Drama at the Jerusalem Film Festival, 2008 and also inlcuding a documentary about pride celebrations in Jerusalem and how finally all religions of the middle east finally united — around a message of intolerance.
However you celebrate Pride Month — as Jew, Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Atheist, Jain…may it reflect the deep love that our expression of love in the world stands for.
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