Your JUF update

During these uncertain times, it's more important than ever to come together as a community. With this email, we hope to provide you with resources, moral support and other ways to adjust to this temporary “new normal.”  

Visit our JUF Coronavirus Community Resource Page where you’ll find links to more resources, info on JUF initiatives and ways to help or donate. And be sure to check JUF's Facebook page for daily updates.

Let's get together and see the good we did!

Register now for the virtual JUF Annual Meeting at 11 a.m. on September 17. Come hear about the good we’ve done this year—especially during the pandemic. We’ll honor this year’s award recipients and you’ll also get an update from JUF President Lonnie Nasatir.  

The Jewish Netflix has arrived

Chaiflicks, a new movie and TV streaming service that focuses on Jewish and Israeli-themed content, recently launched. They have over 150 titles in categories that include comedy, drama, documentaries, food, music and many others. This subscription service is now available on every major streaming platform and they offer a free 14-day trial.

Five-minute stress re-set

Music. Deep Breathing. Lowering your body temperature. These are some of the quick strategies a UCLA professor of psychiatry suggests may help lower your anxiety during these stressful times. By reducing the intensity of overwhelming emotions, these quick exercises can help you recalibrate.  

Crack open some literary comfort

Ninety stellar writers contributed to this anthology aptly titled, Alone Together: Love, Grief, and Comfort in the Time of Covid-19. This collection of essays, poems, and interviews covers the range of emotions we are all feeling right about now. They also serve as a lifeline for negotiating how to connect and thrive during this stressful time of isolation —and even provide a historical perspective.

Mask upkeep: are you doing it right?

Three medical experts weigh in on their recommendations for what the general public should and should not do when it comes to wearing masks and disinfecting them. Hint: hanging them on your rearview mirror is a no-no. 

A moment of reflection with Rabbi Karyn Kedar

We are in the sacred month of Elul dedicated to forgiveness and contemplation. May our hearts open and our spirits deepen.  

Perpetual Crossings  

I walk softly on the damp wooded path. 

Mostly I look down 

and see the ground beneath my feet is soft earth, gentle moss, 

and, of course, fallen leaves, which, like angels, have floated to earth forming a gently lit path in the woods. 

And for every chasm along the way, 

for every fast-moving stream or deeply cut valley, a bridge appears. 

It seems that there is always a way across, 

a way to get to the other side of fear, of sadness, of disappointment. 

There is always a way. 

Maybe goodness is the bridge, or beauty is the bridge. Love is the bridge. 

Forgiveness is the bridge. 

Of this I am sure: 

the path is eternal—it is our life and the length of our days. 

And the bridge is eternal— 

there are many ways to cross what seems impossible. Stones in the river, ropes suspended, planks of wood, arches of steel like love, patience, acceptance 

and forgiveness. 

From: Amen: Seeking Presence with Prayer, Poetry, and Mindfulness Practice 

Author, Karyn D. Kedar, Senior Rabbi, B’nai Jehoshua Beth Elohim.