I had been going to shul since I was a child, but that didn't mean I understood what was going on -- the Learners' Service made the Friday evening worship much more understandable and approachable. (from a congregant)
Do you feel lost during the Friday evening service?
Do you wish you could participate more?
If you answered yes, then the Learners Service is for you!
Deepen your personal connection to the Friday evening Kabbalat Shabbat and Ma’ariv Services!
Increase your ability to participate
Learn to develop spiritual mindfulness (kavanah)
Discover the liturgical, spiritual, and emotional structure of the service
The Learners Service Approach to Jewish Spiritual Practice
Many Jews describe the traditional service as a train roaring through the station, leaving them alone on the platform unable to board. There we stand with a ticket in our hand, suitcase at our feet, and wonder why the train didn't stop to let us on.
The traditional service is our heritage and expresses the values of our culture. It developed over hundreds of years and offers a deep and intricate path of spirituality. But the ancient origins and depth of its meanings can also make the service seem inaccessible and forbidding.
The goal of the Learners Service, meeting each 4th Friday of the month, is to help each worshipper find personal meaning and connection to the words of this ancient prayer text. While the spirit is innate in everyone, the ability to focus our attention, and to act with intention, is a learned process. As we learn to increase kavanah, and open ourselves to the experience of standing in the stream of Judaism's history and values, we move from being alienated audience to active participant in the community of prayer.
Each act of participation that we learn, the words that we say, the standing and bowing, the kissing of the Siddur, becomes part of the method for engaging our own spirituality.
To delve deeply into the traditional Jewish liturgy requires us to learn the methods of kavanah, the practice of movement and speech, and to struggle with the meaning of the words. Jewish spiritual practice is built incrementally as we apply each of these techniques to the service. The Learners Service offers worshippers the opportunity to learn and practice each of these steps of the path to Jewish spirituality.
Do you feel lost during the Friday evening service?
Do you wish you could participate more?
If you answered yes, then the Learners Service is for you!
Deepen your personal connection to the Friday evening Kabbalat Shabbat and Ma’ariv Services!
Increase your ability to participate
Learn to develop spiritual mindfulness (kavanah)
Discover the liturgical, spiritual, and emotional structure of the service
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