Nishmat - Landmark US program graduates first female halachic advisers | The Times of Israel

Way to go Nishmat!  Halachic advisors have a place in Judaism, and the newest group of women to be certified as such was trained right here in New Jersey!

In Israel, Nishmat houses many different programs including the Alisa Flatow Overseas Program which educates women from around the world.

Landmark US program graduates first female halachic advisers | The Times of Israel

So this is how Conservative Judaism expresses its values? Barking up the right tree - The Jewish Standard

At first one wants to laugh when he reads this article from New Jersey's The Jewish Standard about the bestowing of Hebrew names on pet dogs.  Then one wants to cry when he realizes that the role of the Conservative rabbi has become more of a performer than a dispenser of Jewish law, lore and kindness.

I have known, and prayed with, several Conservative rabbis in my lifetime.  And I was proud to be a member of their congregations.  Each showed himself to be concerned about the foundations of Judaism - Torah and halacha.  They could teach a course in either based upon traditional viewpoints and explain why Conservative Judaism has moved away from the Shulchan Aruch, the Code of Jewish Law adhered to by the Orthodox.

Says the sponsoring rabbi, Arthur Wiener-

“This was not a bark mitzvah.” That is, it was not a joke, and it was not an opportunity to be cutesy. Instead, “I had a specific purpose in mind,” he continued.

“This was an opportunity to talk about names — about the importance of names in Jewish tradition — and also to try to build from the connection many people have with their pets to a larger conversation about Jewish values. The truth — or at least my truth — is that it’s often very difficult to start a conversation about Jewish values. So we are duty bound to try to find new ways of engaging them with Jewish values, with mitzvot, with those things that previous generations can take for granted but we cannot.

“This event had no straight lines, no sitting in rows,” Weiner went on. “It was in the shul backyard, and there was a lot of laughter.”

It also allowed people the “opportunity to talk about some of the great Jewish values, which we believe we originally shared with the world, about the responsibility of human beings toward animals. That ethos is now very much part of American values and culture, but it is a relatively new advance in human history. It comes from our Torah and teachers.

No people, it is a joke when you cannot have a conversation as outlined by the rabbi without stretching the bounds of common sense in order to attract listeners.  Is that what Conservative Judaism had in mind when it was founded?

Read the full article from the Jewish Standard: Barking up the right tree.

All I can say is gevalt!!

Rabbi Eliezer Zwickler - What happens when you've lost your ethics

Why did God flood the earth?  Robbery was out of control.  Rabbi Eliezer Zwickler of Congregation Ahawas Achim B'nai Jacob and David in West Orange, New Jersey reminds us that ethics in business is just as important as being certain the chicken is kosher.  And I agree.
Stephen M. Flatow