cliff. She says, “It was quite a drop, and I
thought, you know, this is scary, but it’s not
as scary as what I did to get here. So I turned
around and I went down that ladder.”
Bernstein continues, “Before I began
my studies at HUC-JIR many people told
me what a good thing it was that someone
like me – with gray hair and lots of life expe-
rience – was going to become a rabbi. It gave
me hope – as I closed my psychotherapy
practice and prepared to begin my studies –
that taking on a new professional identity
would not be all that difficult. After classes
started, it quickly became apparent to me
that I would face the same academic chal-
lenges as my younger classmates, and that
they had something to teach me. Many of my
fellow students – Jewish studies majors in col-
lege – had far more Jewish knowledge than
I did. Many had spent considerable
time in Israel, which I was seeing for
the first time.”
Bernstein commuted to New
York for the duration of her stateside
years of study, during which time she
served as student rabbi at Northern
Virginia Hebrew Congregation in
Reston, VA, taught Introduction to Ju-
daism at the Union for Reform Judaism, and
received chaplaincy training at Sibley Me-
morial Hospital. A paper on “God and Evil”
for Dr. Eugene Borowitz’s class grew out of
her personal life experience. Wanting to pur-
sue further study on the “breadth of our
history and experience and how
Halakhah
has helped us to survive and adapt in situa-
tions that the rabbis never could have
envisioned,” she wrote her rabbinical thesis
on responsa from the Holocaust era, under
the guidance of Dr. Alyssa Gray.
“
Being a second career student has been
a tremendous amount of fun, very reward-
ing, and very intellectually stimulating. No
one has ever said to me, ‘Oh, what are you
doing here?’”
Bernstein was among the demonstrators protesting
Scotland’s release of one of the bombers of Pan Am
Flight 103 when Libyan leader Qaddafi addressed
the U.N.
24
| THE CHRONICLE
MEET HUC-J IR’S STUDENTS
F
eeling that something was missing
from her life,
Rachael Bregman,
N
’10,
decided to hike the Ap-
palachian Trail. Traveling alone for six
months, from Georgia to Maine, she was
“
surrounded by other people with pro-
found faith,” She reminisced, “It was an
incredible experience. I cried probably
every day. And I hated it often. And I
love it more looking back on it. Some-
times I think I would give anything to do
it again. And sometimes I think I’d have
to be crazy.”
Bregman’s journey first began in a
deeply committed, Reform Jewish home
in the suburbs of Boston. While she
loved her Jewish roots, she went to
Boston College, a Catholic university.
Ironically, this choice was what pushed
her toward Jewish professional work. “I
missed being around Jews,” she ex-
plained. So she became a vice president
of BC’s Jewish student union and began
working as a youth group advisor and
Hebrew School teacher at a local Con-
servative synagogue. Her search for
deeper meaning in her life propelled her
to take that life-changing hike.
With her newfound experiences in
tow, Bregman resumed being a youth ed-
ucator and advisor, serving as a “de-facto
rabbi” for the youth community of a syn-
agogue. “I loved mattering to people” she
says, but ultimately she felt she needed
“
more training to really be able to help
people” and applied to HUC-JIR. How-
ever, she explains, “the personal
interactions that first prompted me to
become a rabbi are no longer the reasons
I will become a rabbi.” Bregman’s experi-
ences along the way have helped shift her
thinking.
Her first stop was HUC-JIR’s Year-
In-Israel Program in Jerusalem, where her
vision for her life began to reshape itself.
The personal turmoil of getting married
and divorced in quick succession, how-
ever, hit her hard. She took a year off
from HUC- JIR to recover while study-
ing at the Pardes Institute of Jewish
Studies and developed a strong support
network of other transplanted Americans
and Israeli friends.
A presentation about chaplaincy in
the American military services inspired
her to return to the U.S. and go into the
Navy before she started her second year
of rabbinical school. “All I wanted to do,”
she affirmed, “was volunteer.” She is now
a U.S. Naval Chaplain Candidate and
Ensign.
Back at HUC-JIR, she looked to
broaden her horizons beyond classroom
learning and started working with, and
eventually joined the leadership team of
the New York School’s Soup Kitchen – a
cause in which she is still actively in-
volved. Every Monday evening, Bregman
interacted with people from diverse walks
of life, levels of education, and religious
faiths. She offered weekly teachings that
integrated Jewish heritage and secular be-
liefs, discussing “issues of justice, poverty,
hunger, and homelessness with reference
to Talmudic sources.”
One act of
hesed
led to another and
in December 2008, Bregman and a
group of twenty young Jews, including
HUC-JIR classmates, went on the URJ
mission to volunteer in the aftermath of
Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.
Bregman was dismayed by the continued
devastation four years after the storm and
touched by the gratitude of the Louisiana
families.
On New Year’s Eve, Bregman spent
the night at a shelter in a Brooklyn
Heights Synagogue, where she spread
hope for the New Year and made pan-
cakes. She then went to Hazon’s Food
Conference in Monterey, CA, to learn
about Jews, food, and justice. Back in
FACING EVIL, FINDING GOD
(
continued)
F I ND I NG A J EWI S H PAT
Sarah Goldberg
