צדק צדק תרדוף | Devarim 16:20
“The purpose of a synagogue is to do mitzvot.”
(Rabbi Stuart Kelman, z”l, quoted in the 7/16/99 issue of the Jewish Bulletin of Northern California in an article about Netivot Shalom observing its 10th anniversary)
Contributed by Esther Brass-Chorin, Allan Berkowitz, Joan Bradus, Joel Gerwein and Michael Saxe-Taller
“The Social Action ‘committee’ has always been a community of cats,” according to long-term member Joan Bradus. There have always been members spearheading various projects such as the community blood drive, cooking meals at shelters, hosting an Iftar dinner, holding services at senior residence facilities, volunteering at food banks, collecting supplies to donate to various groups, turning our building green, etc. Then, as Joan explained, “After the murder of George Floyd in 2020, a number of people got together to explore the concepts of racism and antiracism, and to do self-examination, as individuals and as part of a Jewish community that has experienced both discrimination and privilege. The Community Action Working Group (CAWG) grew out of those years of study” and an intense desire to put learning into action. Esther Brass-Chorin became the chair of the CAWG (Contact: estherbrass@gmail.com)
The Community Action Working Group is only one of the many social action and social justice groups and activities blossoming at Netivot Shalom, including two new ones: an Immigrant Support Food Pod and the Netivot Social Justice Organizing Team. We are excited to share details of all of these initiatives.
Community Action Working Group
CAWG volunteers are currently doing social justice work with a number of community-based organizations including:
*Step Up Supported Housing and BOSS (Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency). Volunteers delivered welcome baskets of essential items (sheets, blankets, towels, dishes and silverware) to the residents of Step Up, the supported housing residence across the street on University Ave. which provides formerly unhoused and low-income people with housing and wrap-around services from BOSS. CAWG recently offered a cooking class at Step Up and is currently in conversation with BOSS about offering other on-site classes residents might want at both Step Up and the Berkeley Women’s (and children’s) shelter. Please consider contributing to the CNS Housing and Food Security Community Action Fund so that this work can expand.
*McGee Baptist Church and Center for Food Faith and Justice. CAWG volunteers help with the weekly sorting of food donations for the church’s community hot lunch program to support the hungry in our community. We are also building an ongoing relationship with the church community and its sister organization, Center for Food Faith and Justice, which leverages their two nearby plots of land to provide fresh produce for the Food Program, engage at-risk youth, provide training for homeless and formerly incarcerated people to enter the work force, and do urban farming and healthy eating education in their community.
*Berkeley Public School Fund. CAWG volunteers help at monthly food pantries run by the Berkeley Public School Fund and the Berkeley Food Network.
*Consider the Homeless! Consider The Homeless! provides a hot meal to unhoused folks (along with donated bread and survival supplies) twice a week, year-round. Netivot volunteers began working with this group in June, preparing a large batch of hearty soup, which others then drove around town, serving folks wherever they were. If there are enough volunteers, this will become a monthly activity. (Contact: rkonoff@gmail.com)
Other Long-Term Social Justice/Social Action Projects
Long-term Netivot Shalom social justice/action activities include:
*Climate Tzedek which does advocacy work to support California legislation and rulemaking to address the climate crisis including supporting: a ban on new oil and gas wells within a half mile of schools and clinics, a campaign called Make Polluters Pay that would require big oil to pay into a climate mitigation fund, and plug-in and community solar acts to make solar more affordable and easier to install and to work around the onerous permitting requirements of the utilities in California. Climate Tzedek works with Dayenu, a national Jewish climate change organization, and with Dayenu circles at synagogues across the state. (Contact: jgerwein@gmail.com)
*The Interfaith Group which plans activities with the Pacifica Institute, a Turkish Muslim group, to promote interfaith relationships and understanding including an annual Iftar meal, an annual summer picnic, and discussion groups. (Contact: tobie.lurie@gmail.com or serenaheaslip@yahoo.com)
*The Annual Interfaith Blood Drive which helps meet critical medical needs by co-sponsoring this drive with five other local faith-based groups. You can help organize the next blood drive (July 28, 2026) or plan to join on the day of the drive as a donor or volunteer. (Contact: marybreiner@pacbell.net or vickisommer@gmail.com)
Immigrant Support Food Pod
In addition to these initiatives, Rabbi Allan Berkowitz recently organized a group of Netivot volunteers into the Immigrant Support Food Pod to shop for and deliver weekly groceries to immigrant families who have become food insecure. The assault on immigrants perpetrated by the government impacts immigrants in many unexpected ways. Some immigrant families become food-insecure because a loved one has been apprehended by ICE and suddenly the family has lost crucial income. Others are remaining underground, afraid to even go to the supermarket lest they not return. Netivot volunteers shop for and deliver the parcels. Faith in Action East Bay (FIAEB), a social justice community-organizing nonprofit, selects the recipient families and provides guidance in addressing the families’ needs. The volunteers approach this work with great sensitivity and the desire to be empathetic, supportive, and respectful. The families provide a weekly shopping list with their requested food items. The shoppers frequent markets likely to stock the ethnic food items the families prefer.
Some of the shoppers donate the cost of the food they purchase, while others request reimbursement. Those reimbursements are made from funds donated by congregants to support this work. There are more volunteers wanting to participate and while willingness to pay for the groceries is not a requirement of volunteering, we can only support more families if we can ensure that we have enough donations to cover the costs of weekly food packages.
Interested in learning more? Contact Rabbi Allan Berkowitz (allanleeb1@gmail.com). Donations may be made to the Housing and Food Security Fund (one of the donation options on the CNS website) with a note indicating ‘Immigrant Food Support.’
Social Justice Organizing Team
While all this hands-on work is so crucial and doing it together as a community is so uplifting, it is also, as Michael Saxe-Taller notes, “useful to have a larger vision and sense of what you’d like to achieve to both inspire and inform the work.” That aim and a desire to to get away from the “herding cats” model of the past are what recently led congregants Michael Saxe-Taller and Rabbi Allan Berkowitz to pull together another group, the Social Justice Organizing Team, with the goal of uplifting social justice as a central orientation of Netivot Shalom. The synagogue’s mission statement defines our core values as “belonging, learning, ritual, and justice.” Over the years, a lot of effort has gone into promoting the first three pillars. Given that we are living, as Michael says, in “a time of active threat to Jews and the Jewish values of human dignity, equality, and care for the earth,” we can and should work together to “more fully implement our Jewish values beyond the walls of our community.” The current time is calling on us to heed the last pillar of our mission statement: “We embrace Judaism’s call to repair the world through deeds of loving kindness and social action.”
A few months ago, Allan Berkowitz, with years of experience as Chief Operating Officer at Faith in Action East Bay and Michael Saxe-Taller, with experience as a community organizer connecting faith-based institutions to community organizations with shared goals, convened a meeting with congregants engaged in social justice including Ariel Gold, Barry Kamil, Joan Bradus, and Esther Brass-Chorin to envision how Netivot Shalom could do more. At the recent retreat, the group hosted a lively discussion with other interested congregants to share experiences with social justice work that have inspired them and to envision what more could happen at Netivot Shalom. In describing the discussion at the retreat, Michael said, “People love Netivot Shalom and getting to do this work at their home base is crucial.”
You will be hearing more from the Social Justice Organizing Team in the weeks ahead. On Shabbat Shoftim, August 15, the Parashat Shoftim opens with the exhortation to pursue justice. We will hold a special “Social Justice Shabbat” and members of the Organizing Team will lead services, give the drasha and host an after- kiddush talk focused on social justice.
Communal Pursuit of Justice
With the November midterms around the corner, and the challenges of growing economic inequality, the scapegoating of immigrant communities, wars, the climate crisis, and the ongoing threat to our democracy, now is a great time to shift focus to what more we can do as a community to bring our core value of justice to the forefront of our life as a congregation. Why not envision a Netivot Shalom where engaging in justice work is as ingrained as attending shul on Shabbat or the High Holidays and where we strive together in a communal pursuit of justice?
For more information and to get involved with the Social Justice Organizing Team, please contact:
Esther Brass-Chorin (estherbrass@gmail.com)
Allan Berkowitz (allanleeb1@gmail.com)
Michael Saxe-Taller (michaelsaxetaller@gmail.com)
Barry Kamil (barkam@sbcglobal.net)