Total Allocations Since Program Inception | $75,180.00 |
Eileen R. Ruddell
About Eileen R. Ruddell
Posts by Eileen R. Ruddell:
Online Registration
By Eileen R. Ruddell in Registration Forms
Eighth Grade
By Eileen R. Ruddell in Registration Forms
Welcome to the Congregation Or Chadash Religious School! Please use the links below to download all the forms you’ll need to make sure your child is registered for our Religious School program. Completed forms can be emailed to rina@octucson.org, faxed to (520) 512-8600, or sent to
Congregation Or Chadash
ATTN: Rina Liebeskind
3939 N. Alvernon Way
Tucson, AZ 85718
Please contact Rina Liebeskind, Executive Administrator & Director of Youth Engagement, at (520) 900-7030 with any questions about our program or about the registration process.
Blank Registration Form for New Students
Third Grade through Seventh Grade
By Eileen R. Ruddell in Registration Forms
Welcome to the Congregation Or Chadash Religious School! Please use the links below to download all the forms you’ll need to make sure your child is registered for our Religious School program. Completed forms can be emailed to rina@octucson.org, faxed to (520) 512-8600, or sent to
Congregation Or Chadash
ATTN: Rina Liebeskind
3939 N. Alvernon Way
Tucson, AZ 85718
Please contact Rina Liebeskind, Executive Administrator & Director of Youth Engagement, at (520) 900-7030 with any questions about our program or about the registration process.
Blank Registration Form for New Students
Little Pishers (Preschool – Age 4)
By Eileen R. Ruddell in Registration Forms
Welcome to the Congregation Or Chadash Religious School! Please use the links below to download all the forms you’ll need to make sure your child is registered for our Religious School program. Completed forms can be emailed to rina@octucson.org, faxed to (520) 512-8600, or sent to
Congregation Or Chadash
ATTN: Rina Liebeskind
3939 N. Alvernon Way
Tucson, AZ 85718
Please contact Rina Liebeskind, Executive Administrator & Director of Youth Engagement, at (520) 900-7030 with any questions about our program or about the registration process.
Blank Registration Form for New Students
2016-2017
By Eileen R. Ruddell in Noah Cohen Memorial Youth Philanthropy Program
Objective: Help reduce suicide and bullying of youth in the LGBTQ community through training, prevention, and education.
Agency | Program | Amount |
Southern Arizona AIDS Foundation for ALLY (Arizona’s Life Links for Youth) | Gatekeepers: a training in suicide prevention | $3,000.00 |
Camp Born This Way | 4 day, 3 night camp for trans and gender-creative youth and their families in a judgement-free environment | $500.00 |
Total Allocated 2016-2017 | $3,500.00 |
2015-2016
By Eileen R. Ruddell in Noah Cohen Memorial Youth Philanthropy Program
Objective: Help reduce the trauma and incidence of child abuse through treatment, prevention, and education.
Agency | Program | Amount |
Arizona Children’s Association | 50 Comfort Kits ($500) and 80 hours of group therapy ($1,600) | $2,100.00 |
Child & Family Resources | 66 Child Safety Kits and smoke alarms | $1,000.00 |
Total Allocated 2015-2016 | $3,100.00 |
Give Bigotry and Racism No Quarter
By Eileen R. Ruddell in Articles No Comments
Give Bigotry and Racism No Quarter
Published inthe August 14 edition of the ArizonaJewish Post
By RabbiThomas Louchheim
In one month, many of us will gatherin our synagogues, observing the beginning of the New Year. Ten days later wewill fast and be called to look beyond our needsand our yearnings to care for those whose basic needs are not being met. Irealize today that my fulfillment is not found by remaining isolated. True gooddepends on my participation with others in need. The Prophet Isaiah calls usto, “Wash yourselves clean; put your evil doings away from My sight. Cease todo evil. Learn to do good. Devote yourselves to justice; aid the wronged.Uphold the rights of the orphan; defend the cause of the widow.” (Isaiah1:16-17)
While writing this article, I reviewed some events of the last severalweeks. On July 27, the national board of the Boy Scouts of America removedrestrictions on openly gay leaders and employees and the Mormon Churchthreatened to abandon their association with the group. On Aug. 3, Inbar Azrak,a 27-year-old Jewish Israeli, was injured after a firebomb was thrown at hercar in the Arab neighborhood of Beit Hanina in East Jerusalem. On July 19,Samuel DuBose, a 43-year-old black man, was killed in his car by a Universityof Cincinnati police officer during a routine traffic stop. On July 30, sixpeople were stabbed at an annual LGBTQ Pride March in Jerusalem by an OrthodoxJewish man, including 16-year-old Shira Banki, who died from her wounds. On July31, in Duma on the West Bank, the Dawabshe home was burned to the ground, anact suspected to have been carried out by Israeli settlers. Saad Dawabshe andhis wife, Riham, managed to escape with their 4-year old, Ahmad, but all threewere severely burned. Eighteen-month-old Ali was already dead. Hebrew graffiti wasscrawled on two walls, reading “revenge” and “long live themessiah.” Prime Minister Netanyahu responded, “We are shocked by it, wecondemn it fully, the entire Israeli government and all the citizens of Israel.We decry it as a terrorist crime.”
In just a few short weeks we were again spectators to ongoingracism and bigotry. These are not isolated incidents. Over the past few monthswe have been witness to events in Ferguson and Baltimore, the shooting at theEmanuel AME church in Charleston, the controversy over the Confederatebattleflag in South Carolina and other southern states, Sandra Bland found deadin a Texas jail, and the fires this summer at six predominately AfricanAmerican churches. Isaiah is not accusing usof these outrages, but he is questioning us on whether we have, in any manner, devoted ourselves to justice and provided aid to thewronged. We may not have caused these atrocities; but we do bear responsibilityfor them.
In 1963, Abraham Joshua Heschel attended the “second”conference on religion and race. He said that at the “first” conference onreligion and race, the main participants were Pharaoh and Moses. Heschel observedthat “it was easier for the children of Israel to cross the Red Sea than for aNegro to cross certain university campuses.” He categorized racism as ‘‘universaland evil,’’ and as “man’s gravest threat to man, the maximum of hatred for aminimum of reason, the maximum of cruelty for a minimum of thinking.”Unfortunately neither conference concluded with an end to racism and bigotry.
We cannot dodge these issues or remain quiet. We cannot yieldone inch to bigotry and racism. Our concern for the dignity for anyone who isterrorized, discriminated against, or oppressed is part of our creed as Jews.Anyone who offends another offends the majesty of God. An act of violence byword or deed is an act of desecration.
On my office wall hangs a lithograph. On it is a verse fromthe Torah, lo tuchal l’hitalem, “youwill not remain indifferent,” followed by the words of Rabbi Leo Baeck, “Aspirit is characterized not only by what it does, but no less, by what itpermits, by what it forgives and what it beholds in silence.” As we enter our sacred spaces inSeptember, let us not pray for God to make us a better person this year. Let usreaffirm God’s love and commitment to all humankind equally through ourpersonal involvement, mutual reverence and concern for all of those around us. Itis our moral duty to “unlock the fetters of wickedness” (Isaiah 58:6) and to“put evil doings away from [God’s] sight. Cease to do evil; and learn to dogood” (Isaiah 1:16-17). We will thrive individually and as a society only if wereach and accept this divine undertaking.
Seeing the Good Land
By Eileen R. Ruddell in Shabbat Table Talk No Comments
“Let me go over, I pray, and see the good land…” (Deut 3:25).
Moses is asking God to let him go into the Promised Land. Is it not obvious that if he will go over into the land, he will be able to see it?
But a man must pray at all times that God may cause him to see the good in everything. Therefore Moses prayed: “Let me go over…and see the good land…cause me to see only the good side of the Promised Land.”More
Pinchas Is Not Our Religious Model
By Eileen R. Ruddell in Sermons No Comments
When I attend other synagogues on Saturday morning and holidays, I look forward to the moment when the Torah is removed from the ark and paraded around the sanctuary. I stand up in honor of the Torah, following it with my eyes around the congregation, never turning my back to it. When it is in front of me, rather than kissing the mantle with my tallit, I bow towards it as I do when I bow towards the ark during the Amidah.More