CBI Blogs

Hello March!

As we move into this next month on our Gregorian calendar, I wanted to send a big thank you to our community members who shared their personal stories and experiences as we celebrated both Jewish Disability, Awareness, Acceptance, and Inclusion Month and Black History Month in February. It isn’t always easy to put our own experiences out there on a public forum but Cindy Kaplan, Rhyan Jenkins and Lucy Zanker all did so beautifully.

Of course, while February is now in our rear-view mirror, we are by no means excused from continuing the sacred work of inclusion and acceptance in our spaces. All of us on the temple staff along with our board of directors know we have work to do so please, be sure to keep us posted on what you need to make participating in the life of our greater temple community more accessible by emailing me or Sarah Jew directly.

As we return to in-person prayer this weekend, beginning with our first family service in two years at 5:30 p.m. (PLEASE NOTE NEW TIME) followed by our Erev Shabbat Service at 6:30 and our Saturday morning worship at 10:30 where community members are now able to join us, I thought it would be a good time to let you know what is available to welcome you back:

Parking: please park in our big parking lot, not the smaller parking lot at our Child Development Entrance. Our large parking lot offers several handicap spaces with full ramp access into our building.

Our building: a greeter will be at the door to let you in. Our sanctuary space in Smith Auditorium is accessible by a ramp. The restrooms in the space are fully ADA compliant. The restrooms in our administrative wing (just past the welcome desk in the foyer) are closed. Please use those in Smith Auditorium.

T’fillah (prayer): both visual t’fillah (words for readings and prayers) and prayer books (siddurim) will be available. You will be able to find visual t’fillah on a large screen in the space OR you can download a pdf of our slideshow from our website to a tablet or iPad and follow along that way. The slideshows are typically uploaded by 5 p.m. on Friday evening.

Sensory Cart: when you enter our prayer space you will find a sensory cart next to the book cart. Here you will find wiggle seats, weighted lap pads, different kinds of fidgets as well as ear protection: both headphones and ear plugs. At any time during our worship service, you are welcome to help yourself to these items. We simply ask that you return what you borrow.

If this work is meaningful to you and you would like to financially support us in our efforts, please consider a donation to the Zachary Avner Inclusion Fund. This fund was created from the outpouring of love and generosity that flooded into CBI through donations in Zach’s memory when he died in March 2014. Your donation will truly make a difference in the life of our community.

I can’t wait to greet you this weekend or in the weeks to come.

Shabbat Shalom.