In late December, Hazzan Alisa Pomerantz-Boro informed Congregation Beth El’s rabbi, David Englander, and president, Jason Whitney, that she would have to retire. In January, she personally announced the news in a video message to the congregation. And in recent weeks, the synagogue has been using Facebook to promote an evening of celebration on May 13 for its departing hazzan to the wider public.
It’s well-known at this point in the South Jersey Jewish community that Pomerantz-Boro had no plan to retire. She did so for health reasons. This has already been reported in the Jewish Community Voice, the official publication of the Jewish Federation of Southern New Jersey.
But in a recent conversation with the Philadelphia Jewish Exponent, Pomerantz-Boro decided that it was OK to go public with those reasons.
The cantor was born with a rare congenital heart anomaly: Her coronary artery was in the wrong place. Anomalous coronary arteries can lead to insufficient (not enough) blood flow to your heart muscle. The issue prevented her central nervous system from functioning at full capacity.
She wasn’t getting enough oxygen to her brain. As a result, she would often lose her breath when singing or speaking. It was the kind of condition, doctors told her, that if the cantor had been a high school athlete, she could have suffered through a serious episode.
Yet the issue wasn’t that bad for a long time. When she was younger, Pomerantz-Boro would get tired, but she just thought it was because she was working 80-hour weeks while raising two kids.
It wasn’t until she started losing her breath on the bimah over the past few years that she felt like something was wrong. She would be reading Torah or the yahrzeit list, and then she would just stop and hold the podium. Rabbi Englander recognized what was going on and covered for her. But congregants sometimes still noticed, and would ask her if she had forgotten the line.
That, of course, wasn’t the case.
“I’ve been reading Torah all my life,” said the cantor who comes from “a long family line of rabbis and cantors,” according to bethelsnj.org.
In 2015, the cantor fainted, and she began dealing with low blood pressure. She started seeing a cardiologist, who put her on medications. For years, they didn’t work, as Pomerantz-Boro’s blood pressure remained low, and her stamina got progressively worse.
Finally, in 2025, she went in for further testing, including a CT scan and catheterization, and doctors discovered her anomaly. They said they couldn’t put stents in to open up pathways through her coronary arteries because her aorta was putting pressure on her ventricles, and would have crushed the stents.
“They said I needed open-heart surgery,” the cantor said.
It was set for July 29 of last year. The cantor thought she would be back at work by the fall.
Instead, even after the surgery, her blood pressure got worse, falling to 70 over 42 at one point. She couldn’t begin cardiac rehab until her blood pressure stabilized. Three more medications got it up to 90 over 55, and she was finally able to start rehab by December.
By then, she knew she could never return to her former life.
“I was working 12-13 hours a day, six, seven days a week,” she said. “Now I wake up, take my medication, do a few things and have to rest.”
Pomerantz-Boro said the response to her retirement message was overwhelming.
“It’s such a beautiful, loving community. They weren’t angry. They were sad. They were concerned. They were supportive and loving, and sending me gifts,” she said.
Pomerantz-Boro is perhaps best known as a trailblazing female cantor. In 1991, she became one of the first 14 women to be ordained by the Conservative Cantors Assembly.
During cantorial school at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, she became the first female clergy member at Park Avenue Synagogue in New York. She later went on to serve Tifereth Israel Synagogue in San Diego for 13 years before coming to Beth El.
But the cantor said she doesn’t care much about labels. She’s prouder of the work she’s done.
“I’m proud of the hundreds and hundreds of students of all ages,” she said.
Rabbi Englander, who has served alongside her for almost four years, said her impact was immense.
“She has been an irreplaceably important presence in the lives of many hundreds of congregants, always going the extra mile to make people feel valued, seen, and respected,” he told the Jewish Community Voice.
At the same time, Pomerantz-Boro has heard the comments and seen the looks from congregants at various synagogues who weren’t used to a female clergy member. When she started at Beth El, the shul still had a non-egalitarian minyan, meaning only men could lead that service.
She responded by just doing the job she loved.
“Seeing me wearing tefillin meant they could do that,” she said of younger women. “I wasn’t intending to be a role model. I was just being me.”
Now, she has to figure out what “being me” means again. Pomerantz-Boro spends more time at home now than she ever did during her career. She’s enjoying gardening, baking and even unloading the dishwasher.
“I’m just trying to be at peace and hold onto my own spirituality, and find ways to express myself that aren’t singing,” she said.
The faith that made her want to become a cantor persists.
“I focus on gratitude every day. When my medical team told me, I was devastated. I was broken. I wanted to do more,” she said. “But now I’m looking back and feeling like I’m really proud. It took a bit of a mourning process. There’s still sadness. But I’ve come to terms with looking back, and this has been a powerful journey.”