Columns

At Purim, Unmasking God by Way of Dreams

By:

Rodger Kamenetz

Purim is one of my favorite holidays. Living in New Orleans, where Mardi Gras takes over the city for two weeks every year, we know how to do Purim right. Masking is a fun part of Purim, but the fun also masks a serious point: The book of Esther, the last of the five scrolls, never mentions God by name...

Columns

A Call to Action to Ensure That Gays Are Welcome in the Community

By:

Shelley Kapnek Rosenberg

A recent transdenominational study shows significant support among North American congregations for embracing diverse populations, including lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. That's the good news. Less positive -- but not surprising -- was the finding that 73 percent of the 760 rabbis responding to the survey felt that their congregations were doing a good or excellent job welcoming LGBTQ...

Columns

Do the Honorable Thing: Boycott Durban II

By:

Gregg J. Rickman

The 2001 World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance -- otherwise known as the Durban Conference -- was a parley hijacked by radicals betraying the real purpose of the event -- the confrontation of racial discrimination worldwide. The April 2009 Durban II conference promises to top that fiasco, despite the Obama administration's decision to attempt to influence...

Columns

Ready for Our Close-Up

'Exponent' tackles economy, as it institutes new changes

By:

Lisa Hostein

It's a whole different story when the story hits home. Bank bailouts, stimulus packages, automobile-industry restructurings may be necessary evils, but they're very difficult to wrap your head around. For countless local Jews -- as our cover story this week illustrates -- the economic ills plaguing our country play much closer to home. The widowed mother who can't find work,...

Columns

Recent Murders Point to the Need for Stricter Gun Laws

By:

Burt Siegel

Eric Birnbaum and John Pawlowski probably never met; they didn't have all that much in common. One was a divorced, Jewish personal-injury lawyer with two daughters in college, gunned down in a suburban parking lot. The other was young enough to be his son; he was Catholic, with a pregnant wife. As a police officer in North Philadelphia, he knew...