Featured Articles
Feature Article, The Knot Magazine, Spring 2024
“As couples envision what a long-term relationship will look like, it is helpful to seek the support and guidance of professionals to strengthen the couple’s communication skills. This will help them start with a solid foundation to build on in achieving their shared dreams. Couples will explore how their past upbringing brought them to where they are today and what their hopes for the future they create together will look like.” Rabbi Elyssa Cherney. ”
Traditional Baby Naming Ceremonies Are Getting a Modern Twist — Here's How to Plan Your Own
by Jay Deitcher
You Should Know…Rabbi Elyssa Cherney
Just as many Gen Z and millennial Jews can be found outside of synagogue walls, Rabbi Elyssa Cherney wants people to know that holiness can be found outside those walls, too.
Cherney consults with these Jews about how to incorporate Judaism into their lives, whether through lighting Shabbat candles weekly, weaving in Jewish traditions at an interfaith wedding or finding new ways to celebrate Jewish holidays.
The Hora Dance: Everything You Need to Know About This Jewish Tradition
"Everyone in attendance should partake in the hora," says Rabbi Cherney. "As a witness to the wedding that is taking place, it is the community's obligation to share in the joy of the wedding couple. In some communities, the dancing is separated by gender, and in other communities everyone dances together."
If a number of your guests aren't familiar with the hora, Rabbi Cherney recommends enlisting a "hora hype person" (or people!) who can encourage guests to dance and show them the steps. After all, says Rabbi Cherney, "the hora is most joyous when everyone joins in!"
How to Talk About Passover and Easter with Your Interfaith Family
As spring approaches, you might be planning how to connect with your kids and grandkids around the important holiday of Passover.
As someone who’s supported many multi-faith families, I’ve learned a lot about the similarities and differences between Easter and Passover. If your grandchildren celebrate both, here’s my advice based on my experiences.
Parents magazine: Welcoming a baby?
There is a shift in how millennials and young families are choosing to engage with religion so I am meeting them where they are at in order to provide them with a meaningful Jewish life. Read the article for thoughts on how the decision about brit milah: covenantal circumcision is changing.
Interview with Rabbi Elyssa Cherney
Join us each week for a conversation about what it means to be a woman, non-binary or genderqueer individual working as, what we like to call, a “professional Jew.” Tune in for explorations of the unique triumphs and challenges that face these Jewish community leaders at the blurry intersection between the professional and the personal.
18Doors: Thoughts from a wedding couple on their Chinese and Jewish wedding!
During a meeting over coffee, our rabbi thoroughly explained every aspect of the Jewish wedding ceremony – for both Kevin and my edification–and asked about modifications to explicitly include Chinese traditions. We were grateful for her open-mindedness and enthusiasm.
Kveller.com: 8 Core Values of Hanukkah that are Super Relevant Right Now
As a rabbi and a mom, I’m always trying to figure out how to make Jewish rituals and traditions feel relevant to my children’s lives. This year, I felt I had to come up with a meaningful way for my kids to relate to the miracles of the Hanukkah story — especially as they spend day after day experiencing pandemic-related losses, both big and small.
While Hanukkah is a minor holiday in the eyes of Judaism, the story it represents can teach us some core values about how to stand up in times of oppression — or a pandemic — and rise above the challenges we face. Here are eight values that I’m hoping to impart to my children this Hanukkah.
18Doors: How to talk with little kids about death
We rarely talk about death as adults, so it can be extra hard to find language to help kids understand what’s happening, especially since young children don’t get the nuances of tough subjects. The added piece of explaining death within multiple faith traditions may be more technically complicated, but it also has the opportunity to broaden our kids’ perspectives about the topic. So how do you talk about death from a Jewish perspective in interfaith families?
The Clarke Community Shows Up: Rabbi Elyssa Cherney
Rabbi Elyssa Cherney was busy running her nonprofit organization, TacklingTorah, when the pandemic took hold in March 2020. “We help Jews and those who love them, in any capacity they need—through lifecycle events, serving as a spiritual guide, really at any phase in their religious journey. So I was out in the community, traveling to people, having meetings in coffee shops, showing up at hospitals, showing up at funerals and collaborating with local community organizations as well. I also ran events and hosted gatherings for millennials, singles, couples and young families,” explains Elyssa, who is also mom to Clarke preschooler Ava and infant Zeke.
The Knot Magazine, Winter 2023