2007: Rabbi Sue Levi Elwell

Jewish tradition is rich in narrative and poetry. As we journey through the Jewish year, from counting the days of the month of Elul to counting the Omer between Pesach and Shavuot, our texts sustain and inform us. Our texts ground us as we stand together again at Sinai and help us welcome the Ushpizin in our sukkot. Together we will discover stories, parables, and songs that have guided our people for generations, and together we will explore new texts that have the power to spiritually enrich and deepen our celebration of each of the days of our lives.

Rabbi Sue Levi Elwell is Regional Director of the URJ’s Pennsylvania Council and Federation of Reform Synagogues of Greater Philadelphia. She was Founding Director of the American Jewish Congress Feminist Center in LA, and the first Rabbinic Director of Ma’yan, the Jewish Women’s Project of the JCC in Manhattan. She has served congregations in California, New Jersey, and Virginia; worked as rabbi and chaplain of Beit T’Shuvah, a residential program for Jewish felons and recovering addicts; and has helped congregations across the country develop strategies to integrate GLBT congregants and their families into synagogue life. Rabbi Elwell is the editor of The Open Door, the new CCAR Haggadah (2002), and served as an editor of Lesbian Rabbis: The First Generation (Rutgers University Press, 2002).