Synagogue Observation

I am a member of my high school’s student council, Girl Scouts, and also the chaplain of my school’s drama club.

When I visited my first Jewish synagogue, I expected it to be very different. My previous experience with religious ceremonies was limited to a few visits to Baptist churches. The most surprising thing for me at this one was, oddly enough, its similarity to Christian services and rituals. I went into the religious visit expecting an enormous difference in the customs and perhaps even in the attitudes of the people attending the service. What I found instead was a religious ceremony very reminiscent of the Christian ones I’ve been to before.

An agreed set of public goals for our community is that as a whole group we do a lot of community service. For a couple of years my club would go to a nursing home and do different activities with the elderly. Whether it be making them sun catchers to hang in their windows or play board and card games with them. It

In the Introduction section of the book, The Hidden Lives of Congregations, Israel Galindo states that a congregation is a “corporate relationship organization” (3) and is not an organization. He points out that the hidden life of a congregation would depict the “nature” of a congregation. This further identifies the relationships and faith of the congregation. According to him, the universal principles are followed by the congregations so that “systemic relationships” can work. The leaders learn the roles that they have within the people who are the congregation. The journal will focus on Dr. Fowler’s question “what is the purpose of this gathering we call the church?”

The Tucson Jewish Community Center (JCC) is a hub for both Jewish and non-Jewish members of the Tucson community to interact through a number of different activities such as sports, art classes, and summer camps. The primary industry for the JCC is the Civic and Youth Organizations industry which has a NAICS code of 81341. Currently, the industry is in the decline stage of its life cycle with an expected annual decline of 1%. The JCC faces macro-competition through the AAU Junior Olympics and International Youth Olympics, and faces micro competition through the Tucson Soccer Shootout and NYS Tucson (For more details see Appendix A and B). The JCC faces macro-competition through the AAU Junior

Having philanthropy events has always been one of my favorite things about Greek life. Whether it is attending other sorority or fraternities’ events or being apart of our own. Delta Gamma holds two main events for Service for Sight each year. In the fall we have Anchor Slam which is a three on three basketball tournament where sororities and fraternities come out to compete against one another. In the spring we held Anchor Splash which is a synchronized swimming event with many different relay races. This year we had the Whited family come and speak on their behalf. They explained how Lochlan was diagnosed with CRB1 and how he will eventually loose his eyesight completely. This story touched a lot of students, faculty, and families that attended our philanthropy. We made Lochlan our featured anchor man and tried to raise as much money as possible for the family. This event was very successful and we raised over 1,800 dollars to give to the family.

Throughout the world, there are billions of people that profess belief in a religion that most adequately answers the questions that most people ask regarding the origination of life to the self-purpose. Furthermore, within society their holds many people that believe in different religions that can cause for people to become biased and ethnocentric when evaluating certain aspects of a different religion. Due to this task of delving into research of a religion outside of your own, I chose to further my understanding through observing a service at an Orthodox Jewish Synagogue. In being that I am a Christian, I will be observing from a perspective in which I am informed about some of the scripture, but puzzled when it comes to many of the

I have extensive experience planning and coordinating events. Currently, I am a Program Committee Chair Member for the African American Alumni Society at the University of San Francisco (USF). As a Chair Member, I am responsible for coordinating special events, most recently, the society 's spring event the Black Alumni Mixer at the San Francisco Press Club. We did not have a theme, but our goal was to encourage alumni to reconnect and to donate at least $10, to the African American USF scholarship fund. The budget for this event was $5,000. This budget included food and the venue to host 50 alumni. My role included finding venues, and sending invitations to alumni. Over 100 alumni attended the Black Alumni Mixer, and we raised over $2,000. Additional duties as Chair include recruiting, engaging and encouraging Alumni to participate in university events as volunteers and attend alumni events.

I am involved in two clubs at Hopkins High School. I am proud to say that I'm part of the We Serve HHS and HHS Responds clubs. We Serve HHS focuses on serving the community through volunteer. We organized the food drive that recently occurred in October to donate to ICA. Currently, we are looking into collaborating with Mr. Allan Law to provide food for homeless people in the Minneapolis area. HHS Responds is a representation of the diversity in our school. It encourages and promotes diversity in Hopkins. That club brought the gender neutral bathrooms into our school and we are currently working on celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month. We have discussions regarding politics, race, religion, gender, and many other current topics that affect students

Despite it being middle school, my leadership of the first ever NJHS at Sparta Middle School, taught me valuable things about leading and being part of a club with such prestige. As the inaugural chapter of the society, we ran the student-faculty basketball game, baked cookies for Project Self-Sufficiency, and collected food and then visited a local food bank. I learned how much a group of students could impact the community with their actions, something I had previously thought impossible. I will draw from those experiences when presenting my opinion on new service projects and will also try to introduce successful techniques that I used back during my time spent as President of

The final mast of school and community involvement was catalyzed when I joined Key Club as a freshman. Finding a passion for service and leadership, it rapidly became my primary focus in deepening my high school experience. Key Club inspired me to search for further opportunities for leadership and involvement, leading me to join Student Council, Relay for Life, and so forth. Through my various executive positions, I have not only improved my own character and qualities, but also inspired others around me to do the

The California Scholarship Federation at my high school actively participates in our school's peer to peer tutor and mentor program, as well as serve food to the homeless at our local Gospel Mission and assist in the community's effort to clean our local river, the Tuolumne River. Twice a year, we fundraise for the end of the year senior scholarships for worthy senior CSF members and over the summer we organize a picnic

pray to God. As well as functioning as a House of Prayer, or 'Beit ha

The biblical term for holiness is kodesb. The way to holiness, in other words, was for Israelites, individually and collectively, to emulate God’s attributes. The same interaction is evident in the commandment to sanctify the Sabbath, with God and the Israelite people acting in tandem to realize the holiness of this occasion. God shows the way and Israel follows. Synagogue is a holy place dedicated to the glory of God. If prayers are to ascend to heaven, the synagogue must reflect sanctity and humility. God has chosen Israel, both land and people, to be witnesses and a testing ground for God to reveal His holiness in the world and through them the ultimate purpose of creation should be unveiled and clarified.

One day in class with the professor Joseph Hoolbrok, I was thinking about which essay would be easier to do, but then I thought about how interesting would be to know about other religions, costumes and different traditions. One friend of mine works in events in a Jewish temple and I asked him if I could go there to do a site visit. The Jewish temple I went is called “Dor Dorim” and is ubicated in Weston, Florida. As Christianity is my religion, in this site visit essay I am going to talk about the Jewish ceremonies, their sacred days and their traditions.