This originally appeared in Atlanta Jewish Times on January 15, 2020.
“A national organization that mobilizes Jews to volunteer is coordinating the Atlanta Jewish community’s Day of Service Jan. 20 on the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday.
This year’s MLK Day of Service in honor of the civil rights leader is being coordinated by Repair the World, which launched its eighth community site in Atlanta in 2018.”
This originally appeared in the South Florida Sun Sentinel on January 10, 2020.
“Janu Mendel, Repair the World Miami’s executive director, said regarding these service opportunities, “For me, me it’s really building on the legacy of the relationship that exists and has existed between the Jewish community and black community since the days of Martin Luther King.”
By Matthew Kaufman, 2019-20 Repair the World Brooklyn Fellow
While studying religion at Dickinson College, I often asked myself what characteristics are shared by all of the world’s faith traditions. A belief in the supernatural, perhaps? Sacred texts and elaborate ceremonies? The so-called “Golden Rule”?
Although those are perfectly reasonable answers, I believe each one of them comes up short. Yes, several faith traditions are grounded in beliefs that could be described as supernatural, but not Unitarian Universalism. Yes, anyone who has sat through a Sunday mass can speak of Catholicism’s love for ceremony, but Quaker worship has never struck me as overly ritualistic. As for the Golden Rule, try explaining its value to LaVeyan Satanists (one of their church’s Nine Satanic Statements is “Satan represents kindness to those who deserve it instead of love wasted on ingrates!”)
If none of these religions have pomp, principle, or even the paranormal in common, then what do they all share? Simple: they all share a desire to address our spiritual, physical, and psychological needs.
All of us—my tough-as-nails, New Yorker grandparents included—have these three needs. It is why Jesus speaks not only of his Heavenly Kingdom (a spiritual need) but of feeding the hungry (a physical need); it is why Lao Tzu speaks not only of loving others, but of being loved (a psychological need); and it is why Islam’s Five Pillars include alms (zakat), prayer (salat), and fasting (sawm). From the largest faith traditions to the smallest, such needs are elevated to an intertwined and sacred status, each one of them being essential to our collective wellbeing.
Jews believe in addressing these three needs through halakha (Hebrew for Jewish law). At Repair the World, we focus specifically on addressing these three needs through service grounded in Jewish values, heritage, and tradition.
As a national organization dedicated to elevating the place of service in American Jewish life–addressing issues such as food justice, legal justice, housing justice, and education justice (Phew!), Repair the World engages young adults to work closely with non-profits in nine cities to tackle pressing local needs. Whether this engagement is in the form of Repair’s yearlong Fellowship or through weekly peer-to-peer volunteer opportunities, the service experiences address the spiritual, physical, and psychological needs that are vital to our neighbors and our communities.
One non-profit and Repair partner that best exemplifies this service-based approach to needs is St. John’s Bread & Life. Located in Brooklyn, it provides thousands of New Yorkers with hot meals, social services, and pastoral counseling. Whether St. John’s clients require delicious food or film screenings with friends, their spiritual, physical, and psychological needs are all taken into account. Why? Because St. John’s staff recognizes human needs as an interconnected whole; you cannot address physical hunger without also addressing psychological hunger (e.g., desiring community) and spiritual hunger (e.g., desiring purpose).
As a Repair Fellow who works at St. John’s several times per week, I believe its staff has, inadvertently or not, tapped into something vital: the idea that addressing our spiritual, physical, and psychological needs is not only essential to religion, but a religion unto itself.
If our spiritual, physical, and psychological needs are at the core of every religion, then perhaps addressing them in various ways, including through service with others, should be understood as a common tenet linking many faith traditions together. After all, service work not only addresses, in part, those needs for non-profit clients; it also addresses those needs for non-profit staff and volunteers. There is spiritual satisfaction from teaching at Hebrew schools, physical satisfaction from building sheds at community gardens, and psychological satisfaction from making friends at food pantries (among other activities).
By recruiting volunteers for non-profits such as St. John’s, by establishing Fellowships, and by hosting service events rooted in Jewish values year-round, Repair’s work harkens back to President Woodrow Wilson, who once wrote: “There is no higher religion than human service. To work for the common good is the greatest creed.”
Amen, brother!
Matthew Kaufman is a 2019-20 Repair the World Brooklyn Fellow. Their free time is spent listening to Van “The Man” Morrison, as well as conducting interfaith work with the various mosques, temples, churches, and synagogues in Crown Heights.
This originally appeared in the Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta.
“As a Repair Fellow, I connect the Jewish community to volunteer opportunities. An example of my own meaningful volunteer service comes from tutoring with Mind Bubble, which offers free tutoring and workshops for students across the Atlanta area.”
This originally appeared in The Jewish Federation for North America on December 20, 2019.
“While on Birthright I became friends with people who had diverse experiences growing up Jewish. At Florida State Hillel I learned that Judaism is more than a religion of rituals and rules; it has the power to bond us as a community.”
“At the end of the day, I know being Jewish is like many things in life: you get out of it what you put into it. Being Jewish has been a catalyst and a connector to community, social justice, service to others, and a career I am passionate about. By choosing to put love, community, and goodness into the way I experience and express Judaism, I have gotten all of that back at an incalculable rate of return.”
This originally appeared in The Jewish Exponent on December 20, 2019.
“Every weekday Broad Street Ministry’s welcoming atmosphere provides support for all types of Philadelphians. This is the living embodiment of “radical hospitality.” Since becoming a Repair the World Fellow in Philadelphia, I have witnessed the impact of “radical hospitality” in our everyday lives through the actions of Broad Street Ministry.”
Repair the World CEO Cindy Greenberg reflects on the story of Tamar in this article featured on T’ruah.
For those of us seeking to build a more just world, our efforts require relationships with those who find themselves in the marginalized places we so desperately want to open up. We must defer to their experiences, and ultimately their leadership, in order to support their efforts to secure their safety and identity. And we must be willing to be uncomfortable at times when we think the solution could be resolved differently. It’s a reminder of the importance of partnership in ensuring that we support people who have limited options without judgement as they make their own decisions.”
This originally appeared on The Jewish News on December 5, 2019.
Kendra Watkins and Ben Ratner return to Detroit as Repair the World Fellows working with Detroit Jews for Justice and the Coleman A. Young Elementary School.
This originally appeared on The New York Jewish Week on December 4, 2019.
Since Repair the World’s launch 10 years ago, the national organization has thrived by equipping young Jews with the tools to tackle pressing needs in their local communities, ranging from food insecurity and housing and education issues to interfaith cooperation and dialogue.
This originally appeared on HuffPost on November 22, 2019.
“We have found wonderful local organizations that are connecting with issues that are tangible for kids, like homelessness and food insecurity, and try to make regular time to volunteer as a family alongside and learn from folks who are impacted by and trying to solve the issue,” said Firestone.
They’ve packed “birthday kits” for a food pantry and “winter kits” for a homeless shelter through the organization Repair the World and spent time with volunteers at the Red Hook Farm, which empowers local teens to grow and take home vegetables in a neighborhood with limited access to fresh produce.
