FVJN eNews Online!
February 22, 2012
Look at all there is to do!
Mark Your Calendars!
- Feb. 25: FVJN Volunteering at NIFB
- Feb. 26: FVJS at FVJN
- Feb. 26: FVJN Film Club
- March 4: FVJS/FVJN Purim Carnival!
- March 9: FVJN Shabbat Evening
- March 13: FVJN Book Club
COMING SOON!
FVJN Volunteers at Northern Illinois Food Bank!
Feb. 25, 9 – 11 a.m.
On Saturday, February 25, from 9 to 11 a.m., some FVJN families and individuals will work a Youth Volunteer session at NIFB (Northern Illinois Food Bank).
If you wish to participate in future volunteer workdays, please let Rachel know, ASAP (mry98@aol.com). For Youth sessions, volunteers can be as young as 8 years of age. If you’ve done this with us before, you know how fun it is, and it’s a terrific way to help our greater community!
FVJN Film Club
Feb. 26, 4 to 6 p.m. Free (Bring snacks, if you wish!)
Hiding and Seeking
Filmmakers: Oren Rudavsky, Menachem Daum
http://www.pbs.org/pov/hidingandseeking/ for trailer and more info
This award-winning documentary tells the dramatic and emotional story of a Jewish father who journeys with his two ultra-Orthodox sons back to Poland to try to find the Christian farmers who hid their family from the Nazis. To his sons, this is a land where people are beyond redemption. The father hopes that if they can find examples of decency among the Poles his sons will recognize the potential for goodness in all people.
FVJN’s film and discussion group is free and open to all. We’d love to have your vote on films you’d like to see.
Please click http://www.fvjn.org/fvjn-film-club/ for film suggestions and additional information.
COMING IN MARCH!
Purim Carnival!
Our FVJS/FVJN Purim Carnival will be on Sunday March 4th from 12-2pm. The Carnival is free and open to all who wish to attend. Come celebrate with us, hear a condensed Megillah reading, play games, and have fun! Costumes welcome!
(We will have cheese pizza and juice just for the FVJS kids after Sunday school that day, before the party. Please feel free to pack a sack lunch for those kids who wish to have something other than pizza.)
We need volunteers to help with this fun day, with set up, running the games and clean up. Please reply to barb.anderson58@att.net to let us know you can help. We know some of you offered your time already at the parent meeting, but please let us know that you are still available. Thank you!
FVJN Shabbat Evening with Family Service & Potluck!
**Special Guest Stars: Our FVJN Volunteers!”
March 9, 6:30 p.m.
Please join us for a family service especially for our FVJS students!
Special FVJN volunteers will also be honored during the evening!
A vegetarian dinner will immediately follow the condensed service. Please bring a dish to share!
Non-meat dishes only. Please RSVP asap, and let Rachel (mry98@aol.com) know what you will bring (so we can plan accordingly):
- If your last name begins with:
- A – G: Salads or side dishes
- H – N: Main dishes
- O – T: Desserts
- U – Z: Beverages
Service will continue throughout the year. Please see our calendar at www.fvjn.org. Our services are always interfaith-friendly.
FVJN Book Group
May 8, 7 p.m.
The FVJN book club selection for March 13 is Kosher Chinese: Living,
Teaching and Eating with China’s Other Billion, by Michael Levy. Our book for May 8 is Walking the Bible: A Journey by Land through the Five Books of Moses, by Bruce Feiler. The book club is open to all. Feel free to join atany time. Just mark your calendar and come to FVJN at 7 p.m.
The most recent book discussed, The Invisible Bridge, by Julie Orringer, was given a thumbs up by all!
Volunteer Corner
Our Volunteers Rock!
FVJN participants who have gone above and beyond during 2011 will be honored at the upcoming FVJN Shabbat Evening on Friday, March 9. Please join us!
FVJN Lazarus House Volunteer Project
FVJN individuals and families are asked to provide dinner once a month to the guests from our community who are staying at Lazarus House. Please consider helping with this FVJN Volunteer Project and sign up, now!
Lazarus House is a homeless shelter in St. Charles.
Directions:
1. Go to Lazarus house some time the week before the first Wednesday of the month and “shop between 9am and 9pm” for donated items. Supplement from your own home as needed OR shop on your own at your own expense.
2. Prepare a dinner meal of your choice that will feed 85 guests.
3. Deliver the prepared meal to Lazarus House on the Wednesday you signed up for. The preferred time for drop off is between 6-6:45 p.m., but if needed can be dropped earlier and kept warm in their ovens. Please specify to staff that your food be for the dinner meal.
Tips:
*Cook with others!
*Large casseroles as well as stews in large pots are good.
*Do the cooking a bit at a time and/or ahead of time
*Buy big casseroles (e.g. from Costco)
Volunteers are needed to prepare and deliver dinners the first Wednesday of each month. Please respond to Bethany ASAP!
bkural73@hotmail.com
630-208-6301
Fox Valley Jewish School (FVJS)
Next class 2/26 at FVJN.
*Students and families, please join us for our upcoming Shabbat Evening service and potluck!
Jewish FAQ!
ELSEWHERE
FVI Events: Past and Future
The following is from Janet Bell of Fox Valley Interfaith (FVI):
Dear Friends–What an exciting meeting we had last night as we learned about WATER–pure, clean water! Most of us in the U.S. simply take it for granted, but as Linda & Loy Williams who have served with Living Waters for the World in Guatemala told us, 1.1 billion people in the world do not have access to good safe drinking water! An average American uses 95 gallons of water per day; an average person in Sub Saharan Africa uses 2-5 gallons per day. We learned so much from Loy & Linda and thank them for spreading the hope and work being done in 23 countries where LWW installs water treatment systems. And get this–the volunteers take most of the parts for the systems in their suitcases!
Thanks also to Fox Valley Jewish Neighbors for hosting us. We wish more of you could have come and hope that you will all continue your interest and involvement with Fox Valley Interfaith as we approach our 3-year anniversary. Say, this would be a great time (spring or early summer) to celebrate our group and engage in a service project together. Maybe someone has an idea for that. We’ve never had any newspaper publicity about our group. Does anyone have an idea for that?
TUESDAY, APRIL 24, 2012 at 7:00 p.m. is our next meeting with Meg Bero at Aurora University. We will hear about the evolution of the Native American Church and tour the Schingoethe Center at Aurora U. for $3 per person. I will send out a more complete description of this event in March so that you all can pass this awesome opportunity on to friends and publicize it in your faith communities.
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Scholar-in-Residence Program
Congregation Etz Chaim of DuPage County cordially invites you to this year’s Sophie and Jack Edwards Scholar-in-Residence weekend, March 16th-18th.
Dr. David Shyovitz, Northwestern University Dept. of History will lead all on a provocative journey ~ Judaism and the Occult: from the Middle Ages to Middle America.
Following is the weekend’s programming:
Friday, March 16, 8:15 PM Shabbat Service Sermon
Playing God: The Tabernacle, the Golem, and the Magical Hebrew Alphabet
Saturday, March 17 9:30 AM Breakfast Nosh
Do Jews Believe in Hell? Reading a Medieval Jewish Ghost Story Saturday, March 17 7:30 PM
What does it Mean to Believe in God? Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Approaches
Sunday, March 18 9:30 AM Breakfast
The Lion, the Witch, and the Werewolf: Medieval Jewish Monsters and their Meanings
Congregation Etz Chaim is located at 1710 S. Highland, Lombard. For more information, please visit our website, www.congetzchaim.org, email cec.adulted@congetzchaim.org or call the synagogue office, 630-627-3912 Babysitting provided for both Saturday sessions. Reservations required.
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Jewish High School Students: Check out what’s going on in Kane County!
Ma’ayan BBYO
BBYO comes to Kane County! Meet other Jewish teens in our area and participate in fun and meaningful activities!
BBYO CONNECT is open to Jewish middle school students in grades 6th through 8th. Additionally, beginning in January each school year, 5th graders are invited to participate in both regional and chapter events.
Ma’ayan BBYO is open to Jewish students in grades 9th through 12th. Additionally, beginning in January each school year, 8th graders are invited to participate in both regional and chapter events.
For information on the groups and upcoming events, visit: http://www.ckielgin.org/youth-groups.html
BBYO will be one of the world’s leading Jewish movements, convening and connecting teens of all backgrounds who will become inspired to live Jewish lives while making a difference in the world.
Youth Advisor – Ms. Liza Bachrach
If you are interested in joining Ma’ayan BBYO or BBYO CONNECT, contact Liza at Archbroch@comcast.net.
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Soup, Purim, and more!
Coming up in the Etz Hasadeh Series at Pushing the Envelope Farm:
3 Jewish Soups: Sunday, Feb. 26, 2-4:30 p.m.
Learn to cook 3 traditional soups!
Post Purim Craft Party: Evening and Overnight: Saturday, March 10 7 p.m. to March 11 12 p.m.
Bring empty wine bottles and old glasses and transform them into personalized Kiddish cups! Learn to cut, paint, and etch into glass. Celebrate the holiday with art, games, dinner, and music (bring your instruments, too!).
For more information about this and other programs please visit http://www.pushingtheenvelopefarm.org/calendar.
There is a fee for these events. Please RSVP to GenevaFarm@gmail.com
Pushing the Envelope Farm is located at: 1700 Averill Road, in Geneva.
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Pledging for Friends
FVJN participant Kimberly Fivelson is walking in the Avon 2-Day Breast Cancer walk in June and could use your support. Please take this opportunity to honor the women you love by donating to the cause. Every donation really helps, big or small. Donations can be made online at www.avonwalk.org (click on “Join Us” à “Find a Walker/Team” and then type in her name) or email her at kimberlyfivelson@gmail.com with any questions.
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March 3: Concert: “Kadosh: A Celebration of Jewish Choral Music”
(From http://www.newclassicsingers.org)
New Classic Singers continues its 30th season with KADOSH, a celebration of Jewish choral music, on Saturday, March 3, at 8 pm, at Christ the King Catholic Church in Lombard. Music Director and Founder Lee Kesselman will conduct the 32 voice adult ensemble and guest instrumentalists as it presents its third concert of Jewish choral music in its history.
Christ the King Catholic Church is located at 1501 S Main Street, Lombard.
Tickets for New Classic Singers are available through the online ticker order form (http://www.newclassicsingers.org), or at the door. Special rates are available for students, seniors, and groups.
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Internship Opportunity
The Hillels of Illinois Harriet and Maurice Lewis Family Summer Intern Program is an eight-week paid work/study internship program in the Chicago Jewish community. The program includes an orientation to the Jewish community of Chicago — including Chicago Jewish history, institutions, social service needs and information about key leaders. The program also includes twice-weekly seminars on professional development and Jewish themes, plus, a midsummer retreat. For more information or to apply, go to http://www.juf.org/college/lsip.aspx.
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Registration for Taglit-Birthrght Israel Chicago Community trips run by Shorashim Opens February 15!
Are your congregants ages 18-26? Are they ready for an Israel experience? Please share this exciting Birthright opportunity with them.
Travel to Israel with Israelis on a Chicago community trip through Shorashim, a partner of JUF. Registration for Taglit-Birthright Israel opens on Wednesday, February 15 at 10 am EST. Priority registration for returning applicants opens Tuesday, February 14 at Noon EST.
Check out http://www.israelwithisraelis.com/ for more information.
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Please Continue to Support FVJN
Thank you to all of you who donated to the annual FVJN Fundraiser! Your generosity will help fund programs, education, operating costs, and more, throughout the year.
FVJN gratefully accepts donations throughout the year. You can easily donate right on our website: www.fvjn.org, or by sending a check to: FVJN, PO Box 8, Geneva, 60134.
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