Worship and Holidays

Integrated Rabbinic Solutions will provide you with email and website updates regarding the Jewish holidays. Through the Chaplains’ Discussion Group, ample information will be provided well in advance of Jewish holidays. We will also consult with you regarding weekly Sabbath observances. Integrated Rabbinic Solutions will assist in the following areas:

• Distributing an annual Jewish calendar
• Providing delicious holiday recipes
• Obtaining ritual objects (e.g., candlesticks, wine goblets) for the Sabbath
• Creating a personalized Sabbath Service booklet
• Preparing for the High Holidays, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, including the acquisition of a Shofar, a ram’s horn
• Obtaining a lulav and etrog, specific tree branches and fruits, for Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles
• Construction of a Sukkah, a booth used for Sukkot observances
• Acquisition or loan of a Torah scroll
• Purchase and placement of a Menorah, a Hanukkah candelabrum
• Acquisition of groggers (noisemakers) for Purim
• Provide Haggadot (ritual service) for the Passover Seder
• Acquisition of matzah and other necessities for Passover
• Establishment of a residents’ ritual committee to lead worship and holiday ob serva ces
• Distribution of Memorial candles to commemorate the anniversary of a death
• Design of a prayer space

Food Service

Chai Community will work with your nutritionist and dining staff to create sumptuous and traditional Jewish meals. For the benefit of all of your residents, we can provide recipes for holiday and festival celebrations. As each Jewish holiday has specific food associations, your residents will look forward to traditional Jewish cooking all year long. Some examples of favorite Jewish recipes include:

• Honey cakes for Rosh Hashanah
• A Break-the-Fast dairy menu for Yom Kippur
• Babkas (special coffee cakes) for Sukkot
• Latkes (potato pancakes) for Hanukkah
• Hamentaschen (jam filled pastries) for Purim
• An assortment of Passover dishes
• Cheese blintzes (crepes) for Shavuot
• Challah (egg bread), chicken soup and other specialties for the Sabbath
• Ethnic Jewish foods for regular dining, such as deli meats, knishes (meat or potato pies), rye breads, etc.

We can also work with your dining staff regarding the nuances of kashrut, the Jewish dietary laws. Along with the prohibitions against pork and shellfish, and the separation of meat and dairy, we can teach your staff about individual observances and how to prepare traditional Jewish dishes in accordance with specific dietary needs (sugar-free, salt-free, etc.) In addition, we can work with your dining staff to create the new Jewish cuisine, a lighter fare based upon the diet of Israel and the Middle East, a diet steeped in tradition and rapidly gaining acceptance in the larger Jewish community.

Cultural Opportunities

This is a time when retirees have the leisure and the means to study. Chai Community can help to establish ongoing learning events: book clubs, speaker series, excursions, etc. for the benefit of all of your residents. As part of Rabbi Parr’s services, he will present a series of lectures to your residents. Topics may include:

• When Children Marry Non-Jews: How to be a Good Jewish Grandparent
• Jews and Comedy
• Hanukkah for Adults
• The Holocaust and Its Meaning Today
• Israel and Her Neighbors

Chai Community can also help to establish resident-led worship services and holiday events. With the assistance of the on-site chaplain – trained by Chai Community – your residents will benefit from a full array of cultural and religious activities. In addition, Chai Community will link your facility with a Jewish congregation in the area, providing you with a larger community for your residents’ benefit. Through this arrangement, you will be able to provide your residents with musical programs, storytelling, cooking demonstrations, and other cultural opportunities.

Central to your activities is a well-appointed library. Chai Community will provide you with a bibliography of essential Jewish books, musical recordings and DVD’s, along with a link to Amazon.com for their purchase. In addition, we will work with your Jewish residents to establish a donation program, so that they can donate their gently used books, CD’s and DVD’s of Jewish interest to your library so that all of your residents can enjoy them. Chai Community can also assist you in creating a Jewish Book Club at your facility.

Bereavement Counseling

Unfortunately, bereavement counseling is an essential part of a chaplain’s work. Integrated Rabbinic Solutions will provide the Chaplain with training in the Jewish rituals of death and mourning. Whether it is the death of a resident or a resident’s loved one, we will help the Chaplain to ask the right questions and know what to do when a Jew passes away. Whenever possible, Integrated Rabbinic Solutions will offer seminars in the Jewish Way in Death and Mourning, online, at conferences or at special workshops, in order to assist the Chaplain to pastor to all the residents of your retirement community.
Chaplains and other key personnel will learn about specific mourning customs, the laws and customs concerning the preparation and internment of a body and the mourning customs that precede and follow a funeral. As an experienced congregational rabbi, Rabbi Jordan Parr is ideally suited to work with the community Chaplain, both in an educational setting and in emergency on-call situations. Integrated Rabbinic Solutions will also link your retirement community with area funeral homes and rabbis to provide additional support to the Chaplain and the facility.

Diversity Training

Chai Community recognizes that all employees at a retirement community need to be aware of the tremendous ethnic and religious diversity of the residents. Often these employees are also ethnically diverse and may not have come in contact with Jews and other religious groups until coming to work at your facility.

Chai Community offers diversity training for all of your employees. It is just as important that your housekeeping staff is as familiar with Jewish customs as is your Chaplain. An understanding word from a housekeeper at a time of loss, for example, brings comfort to a resident and gives your facility the reputation of being a warm and caring place.

Chai Community can work with your support staffs, such as your housekeeping and maintenance teams, to teach them about Jewish observances and lifestyles. We can help your staff learn about Jewish ritual objects, customs and specific practices that might arise.