During the month of February, six very different media outlets, with six different readerships (plus a major Jewish organization for good measure...and so no one gets hurt) have partnered to create aplatform and a mini-blog appropriately titled 28 Days, 28 Ideas to share some of the best ideas that we have heard from ourown segments of the Jewish bubble.

The rat pack includes:  JTA & The Fundermentalist, the Forward and its Sisterhood Blog, eJewish Philanthropy, Jewcy, Jewschool, the Jewish Federations of North America and 31 Days, 31 Ideas,a project of Daniel Sieradski.

Each of the partners in the collaboration have lined up entries fora specific day of the week (Jewcy has Tuesdays - woohoo!).  As a group, we will give you one idea per day for the 28 days of February.

The goal is to produce some great new ideas for helping out theJews, and introducing each other to our respective readerships becausesomething tells us that your average Jewish Federation follower mightnot be a regular Jewcy reader, and vice versa.  Moreover, if we get these ideas out, maybe someone will run with them (we're too busy - yo!).

To kick this party off right, we have Patrick Aleph (aka Patrick A) from Atlanta, GA.  Patrick is the lead singer for the punk rock band CAN!!CAN and founder of PunkTorah.com.  Through his work, music, and freelance writing, Patrick uses technology and pop culture to bring Jewish spirituality to people who are disconnected from traditional Jewish life.  Rock.

 

I attend Jewish outreach events at least once a week, and frankly the majority of them are pointless. If we don't fix that, the future of Judaism is at stake.

There are two forms of Jewish outreach: social and religious. For a long time, Jewish outreach was based around the idea of getting Jews in a room together so they could feel a sense of social-cultural connection. It's the "lonely Jew" syndrome. Tired of being the only person on your block without a Christmas tree? Go to a Hillel event! Wish you could find a job that would respect High Holidays? Go to a Young Jewish Professionals networking party.

But in today's society, that model is not relevant. Jews do not suffer the open anti-semitism of the past. In fact, recent studies show that Jews are loved now, more than ever, and that the majority of Americans either view Judaism in a positive or "very positive" way.

Then there's religious outreach. Synagogues and organizations like Chabad are interested in making Jews live according to their movement's sense of Jewish spirituality. And for the most part, it doesn't work. Synagogues focus on ritual, law and life cycle leaves a lot of people "out to dry". Also, as interfaith marriages and the overall movement away from theism grows stronger, the Jewish community seeks out spiritual alternatives.

Both of these approaches don't work because their motives and techniques are outdated. Luckily, there is a solution to the problem: the internet and social networking.

By moving Jewish organizations entirely virtual, we are able to reach a wider audience. Marginalized people such as Jews from interfaith households, Jews of color, LGBT Jews, converts and people who in other ways feel outside the Jewish "mold" will be brought into the conversation in ways they have not in the past.

Making these organizations collaborative in the way that Facebook groups and Wikipedia operates means that people who normally would never volunteer for Birthright Israel Next or some other group will begin to connect with one another.  Jewcy.com has created the perfect model for this, with Jewish media as the medium for collaboration and peer connection on a global level. On a social level, people will begin to form virtual friendships that may lead to real relationships over time.

On a practical level, it is much cheaper to run an organization online than brick and mortar. Sure, a potluck Shabbat is fun. But the cost and time to put something like this together doesn't appeal to the average Jew anymore. Instead, streaming an alternative Shabbat online and including a Second Life session or a game of Wii Tennis afterwards would honestly reach more people. It's hard to sell kugel and cantors in a Hot Pocket and Game Cube world.

The trend is already there. In full disclosure, I run a Jewish spirituality website called PunkTorah.com, focused on alternative Jewish spirituality. An online D'var Torah that's three minutes long averages 120 hits during that Parshah's week. When was the last time you saw 120 people at your synagogue? 

OurJewishCommunity.org is actively working on creating a web-based, humanist Jewish shul to address the spiritual needs of the evolving Jewish community. G-dcast.com presents the Parshat every week, through the medium of narrated cartoons. Facebook, Myspace and YouTube have seen a flood of Jewish organizations and content, as the next generation uses technology to create the Judaism of the future.

If we don't face the fact that falafel parties at Temple-Blah-Blah-Blah no longer matter to the average Jew, than we will lose Judaism forever. The future is here, so get used to it and change with the times.

 

Check out yesterday's idea "Jewish Media Mashups," get ready for tomorrow's mind blower at eJewish Philanthropy, and don't forget to visit 28days28ideas.com for the full list of ideas as they progress.

So, as you have undoubtedly heard, the Forward has chosen me as one of its 50 most influential American Jews. Me, Rahm Emanuel, Sarah Silverman, and Lipa Schmeltzer, among others.

This honor has changed my life, especially the magnificent gift of 1,000 shares of AIG stock from the finance committee of the Elders of Zion. It has also caused heartache. Friends are envious, even non-Jewish friends. For instance, Malcolm Gladwell is very upset. When we were roommates a very long time ago, Malcolm used to listen to the klezmer stylings of Giora Feidman on his record player. He is, in other words, very Jewy. He is also deeply wounded. "I am so jealous," he wrote. "Shouldn't there be a parallel list for wanna-bes?"

Yes, there should. If the Forward can publish a list of the top 50 Jews, then Goldblog can publish a list of the top 50 philo-Semites. I don't have a philosophical problem with this, by the way: I dissent from the line, first passed on to me by Frank Foer, who, tragically, is not a top-50 Jew (though his mother is!), that philo-Semites are anti-Semites who like Jews. So, a list, and one loyal readers can help me assemble. I already asked Malcolm to provide me names of other philo-Semites, but he said: "How do I know philo-Semites? I'm such a philo-Semite I only associate with the real thing."

Here are a few names, just to get us going:

1) George Eliot
2) Barack Obama
3) Harry Truman
4) Emile Zola
5) Malcolm Gladwell

Please send your entries to Goldberg.atlantic@gmail.com, and I'll post them as they come in. 

Jewcy is giving away tickets to three upcoming events! To enter to win, follow these steps to get on our exclusive guest list.

1. Register and fill out your Jewcy Profile.

2. Click on an event below and send the personal message, "I want tix!"

3. We'll send you back a message to confirm your acceptance.

 

 

Off the Wall Parties at the Jewish Museum

Thursdays March 20 and 27

A two-week open studio project featuring eleven artists creating and performing in the museum. In this live laboratory, different groups of artists will develop a work-in-progress each week.

Send a personal message for tickets!

 

 

Forward: Readings by Arnon Grunberg and Victorial Redel

Friday March 21

Join Emmy Award-winning author and architect James Sanders for an introduction to Jewish New York past, and celebrate two authors looking forward with the launch of The Jewish Messiah and The Border of Truth. Live klezmer band, flowing cocktails, and dancing against the lights of Lower Manhattan.

Send a personal message for tickets!

Our own Rabbi Andy Bachman is making waves big enough to get him included in this year’s Forward 50, a list that the Forward explains thusly:

Membership in the 50 doesn't mean that the Forward endorses what these individuals do or say. We've chosen them because they are doing and saying things that are making a difference in the way American Jews, for better or worse, view the world and themselves. Not all these people have put their energies into the traditional frameworks of Jewish community life, but they all have embodied the spirit of Jewish action as it is emerging in America, and all of them have left a mark.

Go Rabbi!: Go rabbi, go!
Making a difference? Hell yeah. Making waves, too. Rabble rousing and generally getting people involved without shoving tefilling down their throats and expecting them to get all shidduched up ASAP.

Here’s what the Forward has to say about Andy:

In the past few years, the leafy Park Slope section of Brooklyn has come to rival Manhattan's Upper West Side as a hub of non-Orthodox Jewish life — only hipper. Alongside the neighborhood's five established synagogues — which run the gamut from Orthodox to left of Reconstructionist — several independent minyans have sprung up to serve the area's burgeoning bourgeois bohemian set. As much as anyone, Rabbi Andy Bachman has been in the thick of the Jewish renaissance in so-called Brownstone Brooklyn. In 2003, Bachman and his wife, Rachel Altstein, launched a group called Brooklyn Jews, bringing youngish Jews together for low-pressure text study, holiday celebrations and socializing. The group's High Holy Day services quickly became the place to be for local 20- and 30-somethings. Last year, Bachman took over the pulpit at Brooklyn's largest Reform synagogue, Congregation Beth Elohim. Even as he has taken on the challenge of leading an established congregation, he has continued to nurture the independent Jewish scene, keeping Brooklyn Jews going and making Beth Elohim's facilities available to local minyans on the Sabbath. Beyond Brooklyn, the 44-year-old Bachman is a rabbinic favorite of the creative crowd, having participated in the Reboot network and serving on the advisory board of the Web site Jewcy.

Of course we love the little shout-out at the end, but I think the awesomest part of this is that even though Andy’s got a big congregation to run he hasn’t abandoned his indie roots, and still makes sure that local minyans have space to daven on Shabbat.

Mazel tov, Andy! We’re kvelling.