YEAR THREE: Philadelphia- The Rabbis' Convention

CCAR, the Central Conference of American Rabbis, is the organization for Reform rabbis in North America. There is a conference each year at a different city in the United States, sometimes in Canada and often in Israel. We started going two years ago when the conference was in Long Beach, California and I wanted to see my old friends. Joe can pay for the conference through his discretionary fund. Last year we drove to Chicago, and this year, to Philadelphia. This was the first time I signed up to fully participate.

Joe likes the workshops on esoteric passages from the Talmud, and the other deep study sessions. I prefer sessions about more practical things- money, for instance, or how to avoid burnout.

I skipped many of the speakers and study sessions to go out walking. Wikipedia has a page for places on the National Register of Historic Places in Center City Philadelphia. There are 149, and I visited twenty-five of them, for an average of five per day. I saw much more than that, just walking around. Philadelphia has a hopping downtown, including a "gayborhood" near our hotel, where the street signs have rainbow flags on them. We dined out with friends, mostly people who started school with Joe in 2004. We grabbed a fast lunch most days at Reading Market, near our hotel. It's a fancier version of Baltimore's Lexington Market, with many more options for places to eat, and in a less sketchy part of downtown. We ate with friends one evening at Sahara, a Middle Eastern restaurant, and had a prix fixe dinner at a Parisian-style bistro the last night. It wasn't nearly as pretentious as it sounds. We drove back around Baltimore, and had lunch Thursday at Suburban House, an old-style Jewish deli in Pikesville, near where I grew up.

Joe has two first cousins in the area, and he made arrangements to meet them one evening. We had a fine dinner with his family members, the descendants of his father's two sisters, at the home of a cousin.

I loved spending time with Joe's family, most of whom I have met before, and I love exploring Philadelphia, which I used to visit on day trips when I lived in Baltimore in the 1970s. Our hotel was in the landmark Philadelphia Savings Fund Society building, at one time the tallest building in town, and in 1932, when it opened, the first International Style skyscraper in the United States. There are some beautiful spaces in the building. If you don't look closely, you could miss the fine wood paneling, the black marble floors and brass elevator doors (no longer in use, they have new elevators). The hotel did a fine job of preserving the important features of the building.

We met some new people. At breakfast one morning, we sat with a couple who are retired from one of the big congregations in Baltimore. At another breakfast, I met a male rabbi who told me his husband was home with the kids. We also met a rabbi and his wife from Paris. Everyone had questions for them about the anti-Semitic attacks there. I spoke to Joe's classmates, who are now moving up to senior rabbi positions in large congregations in big cities. Part of me is jealous, but part feels that Joe has found a unique niche here in Morgantown, and I should honor that.

Rabbi Denise Eger, who I met in Los Angeles in 1988, is the new director of the CCAR. She is the first open lesbian to head the organization, and she was on a panel at the conference with another rabbi who is a gay man, a rabbi who is a lesbian, and the deputy consul for Israel in Philadelphia, who is also a gay man. It was moving to see how far the Reform movement has come. It was 1990 before one could be gay at Hebrew Union College, and the panelists talked about how hard it was to not be open at school. One of the panelists attended the Reconstructionist College, near Philadelphia, because they were open to gays before Hebrew Union College.

The last night, a speaker came to talk about the election in Israel. Reform Jews are generally not friends of Benyamin Netanyahu. As a group, we are likely to support peace plans, religious plurality, gender equity, and negotiations with Iran. Many people were visibly upset with the election Tuesday, while we were at the conference. The speaker urged patience and negotiations. He was conciliatory towards Netanyahu and Obama, who have been at odds. He offered hope that things will work out. I'm not sure people were convinced.

It was great to get away, to get some fresh ideas about Judaism, to eat in restaurants, and for Joe, to be with his peers in the rabbinate. At morning prayer services, hundreds of people knew all the words and the tunes. Everyone there is working to make Reform Judaism responsive to the need of the congregants, socially conscious and progressive. I am proud to be part of this movement, even in a supporting role.