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This Jewish temple is providing a home for a historic church in the Village
(New York Jewish Week) — After a six-alarm fire left a historic Manhattan church homeless, a synagogue stepped in to provide a space for church-goers to continue worshiping while they figure out a plan for a new home.
Two years later, the bond between the two congregations has only grown, with a new twist: East End Temple on E. 17th St. is supporting Middle Collegiate Church in its clash with the Landmarks Preservation Commission over plans to rebuild their damaged building in the East Village.
Dec. 5 marked the two-year anniversary of the fire that brought her church to the Reform congregation, or “out of a place in the wilderness,” as the Reverend Dr. Jacqui Lewis told the New York Jewish Week. Lewis said that East End’s Rabbi Josh Stanton was one of the first people who reached out to her after the fire, which started next door and destroyed the 128-year-old sanctuary.
“We just made a covenant to move in there,” Lewis said. “Josh was offering me a tabernacle. This big-hearted rabbi opens the door to a church, in a time of rising antisemitism, that’s just bold, fierce love at work.”
Stanton told the New York Jewish Week that the relationship between the two faith communities “predates the fire itself.”
“The reverend has been a friend and a mentor for years,” Stanton said. “When her community’s building went up in flames, I reached out to her and just said, ‘anything you need, just know that I’m here, know that our community is here.’”
Middle Collegiate Church started using the temple’s space on Easter Sunday that spring. The synagogue’s president Brian Lifsec said he was there on the first day.
“It felt like a tent in the desert for these congregants,” Lifsec said.
It’s not all bleak out there.
I went to church last Sunday, where East End Temple, a Jewish synagogue in the East Village, has been hosting @middlechurch for almost two years after a fire destroyed their historic building. pic.twitter.com/0FjtlXr7TA
— Jacob Henry (@jhenrynews) December 8, 2022
Stanton said that East End Temple covers “upwards of 95% of the cost” for the church to rent the space.
“That’s because of the generosity of our donors,” Stanton said. “And because our community understands that walking the walk of Judaism means reaching out to people who might themselves not be Jewish.”
Lewis is the first woman and first African-American to serve as a senior minister for the Collegiate church system, which dates back to the Reformed Dutch Church congregations that formed in the New York area in the 1600s. She is comfortable leading church services in front of an ark, a menorah and Hebrew scriptures, but aches to get back into her own building.
How and whether she can do that depends in part on the Landmarks Preservation Commission, which is responsible for preserving New York City’s historically significant buildings. It seeks to protect the historic facade made of limestone that remains standing. The church, following an 18-month study by several architectural and engineering firms, says there is too much damage to the existing structure to integrate it into a new home.
“The walls themselves are historic,” Stanton said. “Despite the church’s best efforts, there is no way to keep them safely up. What is so sad and problematic is that from an architectural standpoint, there is nothing they can do.”
Lewis said that the church has spent over $4 million to secure the site, clean up debris, stabilize the facade with stainless steel and paint the bricks so they don’t deteriorate — and it is still not safe to rebuild.
“We did that because we wanted the facade,” Lewis said on Sunday after prayer, as she led some church members to the site of the burnt-down building. “We just can’t afford it. We’re wanting to build a building that is appropriate for this historic neighborhood but also has the capacity for 22nd-century ministry.”
The Reverend Dr. Jacqui Lewis of Middle Collegiate Church leading services at East End Temple. (Courtesy)
In a phone call last week, Lewis said that she doesn’t want this to feel like she’s in “a battle” with the preservation community.
“But some parts of the preservation community are pretty strident about us keeping up the wall,” Lewis said.
The church is waiting on a decision from the commission on Dec. 13, which will decide the fate of their building.
Anthony Donovan, a church member who has lived in Greenwich Village for 31 years, told the New York Jewish Week that “there are deep pockets of real estate that would really love this facade” as part of their own plans.
“Luxury housing would look fantastic behind this facade,” Donovan said. “And they have millions to keep that facade that we don’t have.”
Village Preservation, an activist group opposed to the demolition of the facade, said in an emailed press release that alternatives need to be studied.
“We are urging the Landmarks Preservation Commission not to grant such permission at this time, because we don’t believe there is sufficient documentation that alternatives to preserve the historic facade have been fully explored, nor that there is sufficient evidence at this time to justify the permanent and irreversible removal,” the organization said.
“The facade is on life support,” Lewis said. “We could pull the plug and come back to life. We could have a resurrection. We could have a new life that is both historic and moves into the 22nd century, and that’s what we want to do.”
Assembly member Harvey Epstein, who is Jewish and represents the district, gave testimony supporting the church at a previous hearing with the Landmark Preservation Commission.
“While I understand Landmark’s concerns, I think more important than just what that physical piece is that the actual church and the people behind it get to come back,” Epstein told the New York Jewish Week over the phone.
He added that Rabbi Stanton is an example of someone “living Jewish values everyday” by allowing the church to worship at East End Temple.
“It’s really critical, especially in times where you see an increase in antisemitism, that people who are Christian know that people who are Jewish, while having different religious beliefs, are allies to them as well,” Epstein said.
Stanton said that if it is decided that the walls have to stay up, then the conversation will move into “the realm of heartbreaking decisions.”
“It is not clear if the walls have to stay up, that the church will have to rebuild at all, even if it raises significant funds to do so,” Stanton said. “If they move out of this area, there’s going to be a huge gaping void for hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers. It just wouldn’t be the same.”
The building has served the community since 1892. Before the fire, it served as a community hub for other programs, some run by other synagogues, that include soup kitchens and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings.
The Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis of Middle Collegiate Church leads congregants outside the destroyed remains of the previous church building. (Jacob Henry)
It has also played a role in supporting people during the AIDS crisis, helping people pay rent during Covid and more recently, supporting Ukraine in its war with Russia.
Together, the church and synagogue communities also hold a “food for families” program, where members help feed 1,500 families every Sunday.
Edna Benitez, a church-goer who has lived in the Village for 27 years, told the New York Jewish Week that when the fire broke out, the church was housing a Torah for another synagogue, The Shul of New York.
“They had an ancient Torah,” Benitez said. “Our fire destroyed the building, but the Torah stayed. It’s a huge symbol. We’re here two years later celebrating in a temple. We housed the Torah, this incredible, prized possession that meant so much to you, and now you’re housing us.”
Whatever happens with the Landmarks Commission, Lewis said that she expects her partnership with Stanton and East End Temple “to be lifelong.”
“We have so many things to do together,” Lewis said. “I know that we’ll be welcome there, and I also know that they know that we need a bigger space. In the meantime, they’ve been incredible hosts and they are offering us ongoing hospitality.”
Outside the church facade, Stanton spoke out how in a time of troubling antisemitism — fueled by celebrities like Kanye West and Kyrie Irving and propagated by groups like the Black Hebrew Israelite sect — the relationship between his synagogue and the church represents “real life.”
“While antisemitism is on the rise, so too is allyship,” Stanton said. “The Reverend Dr. Jacqui Lewis, who embodies allyship at its best, is one of the people who reaches out every single time that something awful happens to a Jewish community.”
Lewis, who can command a stage (or bimah), led a passionate sermon on Sunday, with the fire on the back of everyone’s mind.
“Could we do a little interior work as we go along this pilgrim’s journey so that we are not accidentally putting fuel on the fire that is raging and burning down the world?” she said.
—
The post This Jewish temple is providing a home for a historic church in the Village appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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This Orthodox filmmaker strove to find common ground between Jews and non-Jews
Menachem Daum (1946-2024) was not your typical Orthodox Jewish filmmaker. In his work, the late director often strove to find common ground between Jews and non-Jews, Orthodox and secular Jews, Polish Catholics and Jews (which he wrote about in these pages) and even between Palestinians and Holocaust survivors.
Fordham University is hosting a free retrospective of his films at Lincoln Center in New York. Called “Hidden Sparks,” the retrospective kicks off with Daum’s 1997 work A Life Apart: Hasidism in America — the first in-depth documentary portrait of Hasidim in New York City, produced and directed by an insider who knew the community intimately. The film is narrated by Leonard Nimoy.
In the documentary, we see a grandfather chatting in Yiddish with his children and grandchildren at home on Purim; a lively scene at the local butcher’s, and a young African-American’s unexpected reaction to a group of Hasidic men engaged in the tashlikh ritual in Brooklyn.
The film will be followed by a panel discussion that includes anthropologist Ayala Fader; filmmaker Oren Rudawsky (Daum’s frequent co-producer and co-director) and Daum’s wife, Rifke Daum.
On Tuesday, Feb. 3, 2026, Fordham will also host a screening and discussion of Hiding and Seeking: Faith and Tolerance after the Holocaust — a documentary that follows Daum as he travels with his two grown sons to the Polish village of Dzialoszyce to track down the Christian farmers who hid their family from the Nazis.
What’s fascinating about the film is the obvious reluctance of his sons, married yeshiva students, to go on the trip at all, poking fun at their father’s liberal attitude towards the Poles — and then seeing their reaction when they finally meet the now-aging children of those farmers.
As Oren Rudavsky put it: “A Life Apart was our attempt to humanize Haredim for outsiders. Hiding and Seeking is our attempt to humanize outsiders to the Haredim.”
The post-screening discussion for Hiding and Seeking will include the Polish-born historian Natalia Aleksiun, filmmaker Oren Rudavsky, and Daum’s son, Tzvi Dovid Daum. To register for the film, go here.
The retrospective also includes the 2026 film The Ruins of Lifta (2016), a documentary centered around the only Arab village abandoned in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war that wasn’t destroyed or repopulated. It will be followed a week later by a conversation with Israeli historian Hillel Cohen about the legacy of The Ruins of Lifta.
There will also be a screening of portions of Menachem Daum’s unfinished film Memory Keepers, about a group of non-Jews — mostly Christian Poles — working to restore and preserve Jewish cemeteries in Poland.
The film retrospective, which takes place at the McNally Amphitheater in Manhattan, runs from Jan. 27 — Feb. 17. For more information and to register, go here.
The post This Orthodox filmmaker strove to find common ground between Jews and non-Jews appeared first on The Forward.
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Could a video game help combat antisemitism on college campuses?
At a time of escalating antisemitism in the online gaming community, Julia Sebastien’s upcoming PC game, StrangeLand, which explores the difficulties of Jewish life at an Ivy League college, offers an alternative: the digital game not as an agent of antisemitism, but as a bulwark against it.
“What I want players to experience with this game,” Sebastien told me over Zoom, “is the sequence of choices and trade-offs a Jewish student in a really rigorous institution has to make.”
Yet she also has a longer-term, and perhaps loftier, aim for StrangeLand: That college educators and administrators use it as a guide of sorts to Jewish student life in general, and in particular, to “antisemitism on campuses,” she said.
Still, its target audience is one you might expect — current and former Jewish students at North American colleges, who, Sebastien believes, need help communicating “to family and friends when they’re feeling too tired or burnt out by everything that’s been going on.”
Sebastien has made digital games before. Indeed, she’s had a couple, both also academic in tone, published in digital journals. (One explored the effects of burnout in academia.) But thanks to a grant from the nonprofit Maimonides Fund, StrangeLand is her most ambitious, well-funded effort yet.
It’s also a little more personal.
Sebastien grew up in what she described as a “pretty religious Jewish suburb,” a modern orthodox community in Toronto. She attended Jewish day school and was fluent in Hebrew. But she never really took to prayer, she told me, and even as a teenager she had begun to see her Jewishness as an intellectual pursuit more so than a religious one.
She stayed in Toronto for her BA at York University, but then ventured south to Cambridge, Mass., where in 2022 she got a Master’s in Learning, Design, and Technology from Harvard, before starting a PhD in media psychology at Cornell (she’s partway through).
StrangeLand is loosely based on her own experiences in the academy, though it also comprises anecdotes from dozens of other Jewish undergraduates, graduates and alumni, whom Sebastien consulted via a survey. Players will “inhabit the life of a Jewish student who has just left home to start graduate school at an Ivy League university, sometime in the 2010s,” she said. There, they’ll be presented with a series of scenarios, organized thematically.
These scenarios will be “evergreen” Jewish student dilemmas: negotiating obligations around Jewish holidays alongside the traditional academic calendar; staying late at a laboratory on a Friday night versus leaving to meet other Jewish students for Shabbat dinner. And some will have a grain of antisemitism, at least according to Sebastien: how to respond to an off-color remark in a social setting, say, or whether or not to wear a Magen David necklace in public.
There’s no winning or losing, per se. Rather, StrangeLand will aim to illustrate the “impossibility of satisfying the demands of these two worlds; that, really, is the crux of the gameplay,” Sebastien said.
Notably absent from StrangeLand, however, are Zionism and Israel, the very topics that have elevated the Jewish collegiate experience to something of a national issue. Their omission is no accident. “I’m not trying to shine a light on what’s happening now,” Sebastien said. “I’m trying to educate people about antisemitism.”
And to include such divisive subjects wouldn’t help Sebastien fulfill this aim, she feels. “As a designer, I need to consider the very real possibility that for some players, StrangeLand might be their first exposure to antisemitism as a distinct concept,” she said. “And I feel that the best way to bring antisemitism awareness to diverse audiences is to use examples that are clear, universal, and evergreen.”
These hot-button issues, moreover, would seriously upset the vibe Sebastien is going for. “I actually don’t want characters in the game shouting horrific things,” she said. “I don’t want to jar the player. I want to explore concepts in a safe way that can still be emotionally poignant and meaningful and educational.”
The game will have a retro feel, then, a lo-fi aesthetic — the heavily-pixelated, Game Boy-style gameplay that Sebastien adored as a child — which she’s confident will reinforce these feelings of comfort and safety. (She cited Tomorrow, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin’s best-selling 2022 novel about a pair of Jewish, Harvard-educated video game developers in the ‘90s, as one of the game’s inspirations.)
In short, Sebastien wants StrangeLand to be a respite from the pressures of campus life, while at the same time illuminating, especially for those non-Jewish players, the complexities of the Jewish student experience.
How it can accomplish this without meaningfully discussing Zionism is an open question. To my mind, StrangeLand seems to be as much a work of history as anything else. The antisemitism Sebastien repeatedly referenced during our conversation was of the classical U.S. variety, the WASP-y strain of the 1960s and 1970s often found in Roth and Bellow novels. Nowadays, of course, discussions about campus antisemitism are typically focused on something else entirely. So it’s a little hard to square Sebastien’s broader goal for StrangeLand, that it eventually be part of DEI curricula, with its lack of contemporary examples.
But Sebastien is confident players will leave StrangeLand with a more complete understanding of Jewish student life. “I want this to speak to and for Jewish students now and in the past,” she said. “That’s what this game is to me.”
The post Could a video game help combat antisemitism on college campuses? appeared first on The Forward.
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People are enchanted with this 12-year old singer of Yiddish songs
דאָס איז איינער פֿון אַ סעריע קורצע אַרטיקלען אָנגעשריבן אױף אַ רעלאַטיװ גרינגן ייִדיש און געצילעװעט אױף סטודענטן. די מחברטע איז אַלײן אַ ייִדיש־סטודענטקע. דאָ קען מען לײענען די פֿריִערדיקע אַרטיקלען אין דער סעריע.
אין זומער 2020, בעת די װעלט איז געװען פֿאַרשפּאַרט צוליב קאָװיד־19, האָב איך געקוקט נאָך אַ מאָל און װידער אַ מאָל אױף אַ װידעאָ װאָס האָט זיך באַװיזן אױף דער סאָציאַלער מעדיע. דאָרטן האָבן צװײ קינדערלעך — דינה סלעפּאָװיטש און פּיניע מינקין — געזונגען אַ ייִדיש פֿאָלקסליד װעגן די בולבעס װאָס אָרעמע ייִדן האָבן געגעסן אין מיזרח־אײראָפּע.
איך בין פֿאַרכּישופֿט געװאָרן. אַ פּנים בין איך נישט געװען די אײנציקע, װײַל באַלד נאָך דעם איז אַן אַרטיקל װעגן דעם װידעאָ אַרױס אינעם פֿאָרװערטס.
דעמאָלט האָב איך אָבער נישט געװוּסט אַז דינה סלעפּאָװיטש, נישט געקוקט אױף איר צאַרטן עלטער, איז שױן געװען אַ געניטע זינגערין פֿון ייִדישע לידער. דאָ זעט מען װי זי האָט צו פֿיר יאָר אויף אַ חנוכּה־פֿאָרשטעלונג אין דער ניו־יאָרקער אַרבעטער־רינג שולע געזונגען פֿון אױסנװײניק דאָס קינדער־לידל „האָב איך מיר אַ מאַנטל“. איר טאַטע, דער כּלי־זמר און כּלי־זמר־מוזיק פֿאָרשער זיסל סלעפּאָװיטש האָט זי אַקאָמפּאַנירט אױף דער קלאַװיאַטור. מען הערט אינעם װידעאָ װי דער עולם זינגט מיט מיט איר דעם רעפֿרען.
דינה און איר טאַטע האָבן רעקאָרדירט אַ היפּשע צאָל װידעאָס פֿון ייִדישע לידער במשך פֿון די לעצטע פֿינעף יאָר. אָט איז אַ שפּיל־רשימה װוּ מען קען קוקן אױף זײ. איך האָב ספּעציעל ליב „שנירעלע פּערעלע“, װאָס דינה זינגט מיט אַ בעכער אין דער רעכטער האַנט, װי דאָס ליד באַשרײַבט. „דײנו“, װאָס זי זינגט מיטן טאַטן, איז מונטער און אָפּטימיסטיש. „דאָס עלנטע קינד“, קאָמפּאָנירט אין דער װאַרשעװער געטאָ מיט װערטער פֿון שמערקע קאַטשערגינסקי, זינגט זי װײך און מיט טרױער.
אין 2025 האָט דינה צו צװעלף יאָר אָפּגעהאַלטן אין אַ ניו־יאָרקער טעאַטער די װעלט־פּרעמיערע פֿון איר טאַטנס ליד „אױפֿן טײַכל שלום“. די קאָמפּאָזיציע איז באַזירט אױף אַ ליד פֿונעם פּאָעט און שרײַבער באָריס סאַנדלער, װעמענס 75סטן געבוירן־טאָג האָט דער קאָנצערט אָפּגעמערקט. זי האָט אױך דעבוטירט װי אַ סאָליסטקע מיט דער נאַציאָנאַלער ייִדישער טעאַטער־פֿאָלקסבינע בעת זײער חנוכּה־פּראָגראַם אין היברו־יוניאָן קאָלעדזש. זי פֿיגורירט אויך אין װידעאָס, אַרײַננעמעננדיק „זאָל שױן קומען די גאולה“, קאָמפּאָנירט נאָכן חורבן מיט װערטער פֿון שמערקע קאַטשערגינסקי.
לעצטנס האָב איך געשמועסט (אױף ענגליש) מיט דינה און איר טאַטן װעגן איר באַציִונג צו ייִדישע לידער — אַמאָל, הײַנט צו טאָג און האָפֿנטלעך אין דער צוקונפֿט.
* * * * *
שטערן׃ װי אַזױ האָט דינה אָנגעהױבן צו זינגען לידער אױף ייִדיש?
זיסל סלעפּאָװיטש: זינט זי איז געבױרן געװאָרן האָב איך איר געזונגען אױף ייִדיש. זי האָט נאַטירלעך אָנגעהױבן נאָכצוזינגען די ייִדישע לידער. מיר רעדן רוסיש בײַ אונדז אין דער הײם, װײַל איך און מײַן פֿרױ זענען אױפֿגעװאַקסן אין בעלאַרוס. אַװדאי רעדט דינה ענגליש אין שול, און ענגליש און רוסיש מיט די חבֿרים. ייִדיש און ייִדישע לידער זענען אָבער געװען אַ טײל פֿון אונדזער משפּחה־לעבן, און זי האָט זײ אײַנגעזאַפּט אין זיך במשך פֿון איר טאָגטעגלעך לעבן. כאָטש זי האָט זיך נאָך נישט געלערנט ייִדיש סיסטעמאַטיש — גראַמאַטיק אאַז״װ — הערט מען װי נאַטירלעך זי זינגט אױף ייִדיש.
שטערן׃ דינה, װי לערנסטו זיך אַזױ גוט אױס די לידער?
דינה סלעפּאָװיטש: קודם־כּל זינגט מײַן טאַטע פֿאַר מיר אַ נײַ ליד, אַזױ פֿיל מאָל װי איך דאַרף. כ’האָב אַ גוטן זכּרון, הײב איך גיך אָן צו געדענקען די מעלאָדיע. דערנאָך דיסקוטירן מיר די װערטער, זעצנדיק זײ איבער אױף רוסיש און אַ מאָל אױף ענגליש. װײַל איך קען אַ סך ייִדישע לידער זענען עטלעכע װערטער מיר שױן באַקאַנט — מער און מער װערטער מיט דער צײַט.
שטערן: װאָס זענען דײַנע באַליבטסטע ייִדישע לידער?
דינה סלעפּאָװיטש: איך פֿיל זיך פֿאַרבונדן מיט „שנירעלע פּערעלע“, װײַל איך האָב דאָס געזונגען אין מײַן ערשטן װידעאָ בעת קאָװיד־19. און אַװדאי איז דאָס ליד װעגן בולבעס נאָענט צום האַרצן, װײַל אַ סך מענטשן האָבן געקוקט אױפֿן דאָזיקן װידעאָ און הנאה געהאַט פֿון אים. „אַרום דעם פֿײַער“ האָב איך אױך זײער ליב. װען איך זינג דאָס ליד פֿיל איך זיך רויִק און פֿאַרבונדן מיט אַנדערע מענטשן.
שטערן: װאָסער מין רעאַקציע באַקומט איר אױף די װידעאָס?
זיסל סלעפּאָװיטש: מיר באַקומען זײער אַ פּאָזיטיװע רעאַקציע. איך פֿאָר איבער דער װעלט צוליב מײַן מוזיק־אַרבעט, הער איך אָפֿט אַז מוזיקערס און ליבהאָבערס פֿון ייִדיש אין אַנדערע לענדער קוקן אױף די װידעאָס, אָפֿט מאָל מיט זײערע קינדער. לערערס פֿון ייִדיש און פֿון ייִדישער מוזיק װײַזן זײ אין די קלאַסן.
דינה סלעפּאָװיטש: מײַנע חבֿרים קוקן אױף די װידעאָס, און איך מײן אַז זײ האָבן זײ ליב!
שטערן: דינה, װי פֿילסטו זיך װען דו זינגסט פֿאַר אַן עולם, ספּעציעל אין אַ טעאַטער אָדער אױדיטאָריע?
דינה סלעפּאָװיטש: נערװעז. מײַן מאַמע העלפֿט מיר אָבער אַ סך. זי איז אַלע מאָל בײַ דער זײַט װען איך האַלט בײַ זינגען. מיט איר הילף באַרויִק איך זיך און מאַך זיך גרײט צו גײן אױף דער בינע.
שטערן: צי װילסטו זיך לערנען ייִדיש סיסטעמאַטיש, אפֿשר מיט ייִדיש פּאָפּ?
דינה סלעפּאָװיטש: יאָ, דעם קומעדיקן זומער, װען איך װעל נישט האָבן אַזױ פֿיל שולאַרבעט צו טאָן. האָפֿנטלעך װעל איך זיך לערנען רעלאַטיװ גרינג, װײַל כ’האָב געהאַט ייִדיש אין די אױערן לעבנסלאַנג. און איך קען שױן אַ סך װערטער.
שטערן: צי װעסטו װײַטער זינגען ייִדישע לידער פֿאַר אַן עולם און רעקאָרדירן װידעאָס?
דינה סלעפּאָװיטש: יאָ. נאָך דעם װי איך װעל זיך לערנען ייִדיש מער סיסטעמאַטיש װעל איך קענען זינגען װײַטערדיקע לידער. איך זינג מיטן ניו־יאָרקער פֿיליאַל פֿונעם נאַציאָנאַלן קינדער־כאָר, װאָס העלפֿט מיט געזאַנג־טעכניק. מיר זינגען אױף ענגליש, שפּאַניש, יאַפּאַניש, העברעיִש, האַװאַייִש…די דיריגענטן העלפֿן אונדז מיטן גוט אַרױסרעדן די װערטער בעת מיר זינגען. איך האָב ליב דאָס זינגען אױף פֿאַרשײדענע שפּראַכן. ייִדישע לידער װעלן מיר אָבער בלײַבן ספּעציעל װיכטיק, װײַל ייִדיש איז אַזאַ גרױסער טײל פֿון מײַן לעבן.
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