Agunah, Facebook, & Mediation/R' Martin Rosenfeld

Rabbi Martin Rosenfeld
[see previous post Previous post "Why Aharon Friedman hasn't given a get"

My interest in volunteering to mediate the matter of the Epstein/Friedman divorce was based on a feeling that this matter has gotten to the point where there are only losers and no winners. I count among the losers, the Jewish community, as our controversies do not belong in cyberspace or on Facebook campaigns. The fact that Mr. Friedman was the only party to agree to mediation is not something from which I choose to draw any conclusion. A party does not need to mediate a dispute, and certainly does not need to be bound by an unknown mediator’s offer.to assist. However, the entree to Mr. Friedman has given me the opportunity to spend close to 30 hours looking into this matter. I have spoken to parties on both sides of the controversy. I have read much and done some due diligence. What I will say is meant to lead to a possible resolution. It may offer some insights into the need for mediation in highly contested matters, but more importantly it is a plea for constructive action in one divorce matter.

Mr. Friedman has been accused of many matters. He has been called an abuser in a published statement that has likely been seen by Jews world-over. Nothing I have come across helps me understand how this libelous charge can be made. Mr. Friedman, like all of us, is an imperfect being. He has made, in my opinion, errors along the way. That can be said of probably most who go through a difficult divorce. Is he an abuser? Not that I know. If any organization feels that he is indeed an abuser, I would suggest they produce the documentation to us all. There are strict libel laws in this country. Words do matter. Is anybody who does not give a Get an abuser de facto? If that is so, who will decide the matter?. The Talmud calls one who publicly embarrasses someone, a murderer. Would that entitle an organization, which advocates that such a person give a Get  to put that person’s picture on-line with the caption: This murderer refuses to give his wife a Get? I think not.

What’s the point of having a bat mitzvah?

Tablet Magazine

These days, I’m often gobsmacked by girls’ outfits at their parties—and sometimes in shul, as well: gynecologically short skirts, bustier tops cantilevered over barely developed curves, nosebleed-inducing stratospheric heels. The bat mitzvah girl’s friends teeter into the party like a herd of newborn foals. Some hostesses provide baskets of ankle socks so that the girls can dance more comfortably after they take off their foot-bindings.

But I am a little concerned about the big picture. What’s the point of having a bat mitzvah—a symbolic ceremony marking the time when a girl becomes a Jewish adult, fully responsible for her own actions and choices—if she’s going to focus more on the clothes and the party than the ritual? Why choose to do exactly what everyone else does, with the only individualization being the theme colors, the degree of showiness, and the amount of pupik shown by both the bat mitzvah girl and her mother? The ungapatchka same-sameness seems particularly sad when you consider how hard individual girls and women worked to win the right to celebrate this milestone at all.

Private Schools Mine Parents’ Data, & Wallets

NYTimes

Relentless fund-raising, be it for the annual fund, the spring benefit or the latest capital campaign, is as much a feature of private schools as small classes and diverse offerings. But with schools hitting the upper limits of what they can charge for tuition, consultants, parents and school heads say the race for donations has become notably more intense and aggressive. 

Schools are mining online data for details about parents’ homes, luxury cars, private planes, stock holdings and donations to other charities. So-called development offices, once the domain of part-time administrators and school volunteers, have been elevated along with the titles of those running them, who are now known as chief advancement officers, directors of philanthropy and heads of strategic initiatives. Heads of school report spending much of their time in search of money, according to surveys. 

The biggest change is the sophistication of the data available, and how schools can use it. Before a campaign begins, consultants interview 40 to 50 of the school’s top prospects to determine their level of interest in a campaign and how much they might give (a “feasibility study”). The consultants also try to measure a school’s philanthropic capacity (a “capacity analysis”).

Milestone:Senior priest on trial for protecting child molesters

NYTimes

The landmark trial of a senior official of the Philadelphia Archdiocese who is accused of shielding priests who sexually abused children and reassigning them to unwary parishes began on Monday with prosecutors charging that the official “paid lip service to child protection and protected the church at all costs.” 

The defendant, Msgr. William J. Lynn, 61, is the first Roman Catholic supervisor in the country to be tried on felony charges of endangering children and conspiracy — not on allegations that he molested children himself, but that he protected suspect priests and reassigned them to jobs where they continued to rape, grope or otherwise abuse boys and girls.

Birchas Hailanos:Dispute regarding correct Beracha

VIN by Rabbi Yair Hoffman

There is a great debate that has gone on in Torah circles for almost three centuries now.  The debate centers upon the following question:  What texts we should be following?  Do we follow the Shulchan Aruch and Talmud or do we follow the Siddur?  This debate centers around one particular bracha – one that occurs in Nissan.

The Talmud (Brachos 43b) tells us that during the month of Nissan, when one goes out and sees trees blossoming recites the blessing, “Who has not left lacking in His world etc.”

The wording is either “shelo chiser beolamo klum” or “shelo chiser beolamo davar.” The Talmud uses the word “Klum” which means nothing.  The version in the current editions of the Siddur have the word “Davar” meaning “something.” 

9.5 years for sodomizing 11 year old chareidi boy

JPost

The Tel Aviv District Court sentenced a man to nine and a half years in prison on Sunday for raping and indecently assaulting an 11-year-old boy eleven years ago.

As part of a plea bargain, the defendant, Nahman Nohi, had previously agreed to plead guilty to multiple counts of indecent assault and one charge of sodomy under circumstances of rape. However, the plea bargain did not include any arrangement regarding punishment. [....]

Shabbat Lunch is a Country Song.Who knew?

Forward

Yesterday, I listened to a country song on the radio, a lyrical lament of a time gone by, as country songs often are. But one line made me laugh: “sittin’ around the table don’t happen much anymore.” It doesn’t, at least not at my house Sunday through Thursday. Though my kids are still small, we are already scheduled within an inch of our lives, my husband and I are attached to our oh-so-smartphones, and dinner is usually in shifts of macaroni and cheese.

And then comes Friday night, the beginning of Shabbat. The wind up to observing the Sabbath is at times chaotic, because while that sun sets Friday night, no matter what, Shabbat doesn’t make itself. In Hebrew, to observe Shabbat is to be shomer Shabbat, a “guardian” of the Sabbath. I always thought it sounded like Shabbat was prone to attack, or would wander off alone if not for your protective skills. Not so far from the reality. [....]

I haven’t always done this, been shomer Shabbat. I’d been told about it, had watched it from afar. And then someone invited me into her very traditional Jewish home for Shabbat lunch. I once could not imagine observing Shabbat in the most traditional of senses. No cooking, no driving, no television or internet, no shopping, no catching up on laundry. And if there had been texting twelve years ago, I probably couldn’t have imagined giving it up for an entire twenty-four hour period (never mind that Shabbat is actually twenty-five hours!). It seemed so extreme. And yet, when I was first invited to a family’s home for Shabbat lunch, I was intrigued, amazed, curious and eventually, hooked. There was something so calm, in spite of the six kids in the family and all their friends running around. There was so much food. So much talk. So much time around the table. I would climb back into my car after a very long lunch, not so much feeling guilty, as wondering, “How do I make that happen in my own life?” The answer was, incrementally.

Europe's blind spot on anti-Semitism

CNN

It is time to stop excusing anti-Semitic calls for the murder of Jews as an acceptable outgrowth of the Palestinian cause.

A couple of years ago, I was in the Netherlands when a pro-Palestinian demonstration broke into a familiar chant: "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas." The "Jews to the gas" is a common cheer at Dutch soccer games. This was nothing new.

What was new is that this demonstration included a Dutch member of Parliament, Harry van Bommel of the Socialist Party, who continued along as his comrades called for a repeat of the Holocaust.

Political leaders and government authorities often act dismissively when Jews are the target of violence, particularly from Arabs. When a Jewish girl was beaten at school by five Muslim girls who called her a "dirty Jew" and shouted that she should "return to your country," community leaders said they were "exasperated" by the endless attacks on Belgian Jews and asked the government to take action. Viviane Teitelbaum, a Jewish member of Parliament, condemned the failure of the Belgian media and the political establishment to speak out.

Stereotyping of a hoodie caused Trayvon's death?

Chareidim & seat switching for gender separation

Haaretz

El Al passengers are noting a recent phenomenon involving clusters of ultra-Orthodox men approaching female passengers prior to take-off and requesting to switch seats, according to El Al customers and tour operators. 

While the phenomenon of lone Haredi men approaching female passengers is not new, and has in fact gone on for years, large groups of Haredim - upwards of 15-20 people in some instances - are reportedly attempting to secure blocs of seats for themselves. Their persistence is causing consternation and friction, while setting off a host of logistical problems during the course of some flights, according to a number of sources interviewed by Haaretz.

Post traumatic growth: Benefiting from severe hardships

NYTimes

Slowly, though, Beltran began noticing surprising changes. Before the blast, he drifted. He spent a lot of his free time playing video games. Like many soldiers, he was more concerned with figuring out how to cope from one deployment to the next than with finding a direction. He is different now. The bombing, the P.T.S.D. and the challenges he faced changed him. And he thinks he has changed for the better. “This whole experience has helped me to be more open, more flexible,” he told me. “I am branching out to activities that I was once uncomfortable with.” Beltran has taken rigorous tests in pursuit of a promotion. He’s taking online courses toward a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice. He discovered a sense of spirituality, and although he and his first wife divorced, he has remarried and reconnected with his parents, from whom he distanced himself after the explosion. 

Beltran spent years in therapy and read many books about people who surmounted adversity, all of which, he says, helped him change. More recently, through classes and group therapy at Fort Sill in Oklahoma, he was introduced to the science and thinking behind this psychological change. “It’s given it a name,” Beltran said, “and has enhanced my personal development.” The name for Beltran’s change is post-traumatic growth. And the classes he takes are part of a $125 million Army-wide program called Comprehensive Soldier Fitness, which is intended to help soldiers become more resilient and to help them recognize how the trauma of combat can change them for the better. For years, Beltran carried photos of the explosion to remind himself of what he overcame. Now, he says, he carries those pictures to show to others. “I want to share my experience,” he told me. “Whatever knowledge or wisdom I have.”

The idea that people grow in positive ways from hardship is so embedded in our culture that few researchers even noticed that it was there to be studied. Richard Tedeschi, a psychologist at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte, who is both a researcher and a clinician, discovered it in a roundabout way, while he was looking for a new research project. “I thought, Who do I want to know the most about, distressed or violent or crazy people?” he told me. “Instead, I think I want to know about wise people. Perhaps I’ll learn something myself.” He and Lawrence Calhoun, who is also a psychologist at U.N.C., started their research by interviewing survivors of severe injuries. He then went on to survey older people who had lost their spouses. Person after person told them the same thing: they wished deeply that they had not lost a spouse or been paralyzed, but nonetheless, the experience changed them for the better.

Czech railways rolls Out female only compartments

Time

According to the New York Times, the new compartments installed on about 30 trains were instantly met with some disapproval. Opponents argued the cabins discriminate against men, but rail spokesman Petr Stahlavsky told the Times the changes are based on “Western European and Christian traditions.” He added, “This is not any discrimination but social and cultural tradition.”

As it turns out, these types of cabins are not so uncommon. The company said it was modeling its new compartments after the Austrian system, but women-only cabins have already taken off in at least a half-dozen countries including Japan, Egypt, Iran, Brazil and India.[...]

Though men aren’t banned from sitting in the new the six-seater Ladies Compartments on Prague’s trains, women will have priority seating and can ask men to leave if they don’t want to share the space with a Y chromosome. If successful, Czech Railways hopes to continue with plans to roll out 80 more similar compartments by the summer.

Fraud discovered in rabbinic ordination tests

YNet

Five men are suspected for fraud and impersonation after attempting to take a rabbinic qualification exam instead of their classmates on Wednesday. They admitted they were paid thousands of shekels by Yeshiva students to take the exam in their place, since they were not properly prepared. Following the complaint, the police suspects a larger network of fraudulent Yeshiva students is behind the scenes.

The fraud was discovered during a concentrated Halacha exam to 2,500 students. Test supervisors noticed suspected identification cards and after questioning the students they confessed to the fraud and signed affidavits declaring they were paid between 3,000-6,000 NIS for their service. One of the students said this is the second exam he is taking in place of the same Yeshiva student.[...]

Dutch Church castrated victims who reported child abuse & homosexuals

Time Magazine

It not only sounds ludicrous as a medical procedure, but in moral terms it's downright barbarous: castrating young men to "cure" them of their homosexuality. Yet this was how the Roman Catholic Church in the Netherlands treated gays in the 1950s, according to a Dutch newspaper, which claims at least 10 men were forced to go under the knife at the church's behest. The extraordinary allegations, which were published last weekend in the NRC Handelsblad newspaper, have prompted Dutch parliamentarians to demand an inquiry into the issue, raising questions about whether the church received political cover to take such extreme measures.

The newspaper said the castrations were regarded both as a treatment for homosexuality, as well as a punishment for those who accused clergy of sexual abuse. The newspaper said 20-year-old Henk Hethuis had been surgically castrated on the instructions of Catholic priests in 1956 after he told police he was being abused at the Harreveld boarding school in Gelderland. Although the monks were convicted of the abuse, Heithuis was nonetheless sent to a Catholic psychiatric hospital and then castrated. He died two years later in a car crash. The newspaper adds there are strong indications that at least nine other young men were castrated around the same time, either for whistle-blowing or for supposed homosexuality.