Since becoming Congregation Bet Haverim’s spiritual leader in 1999, gay Rabbi Joshua Lesser has made a mark on the Reconstructionist synagogue and beyond. Membership at Bet Haverim has risen 300 percent, and the congregation has become a model for inclusivity while ending decades of wandering through private houses and rented spaces by moving into its […]
Rebecca Stapel-Wax, executive director of SOJOURN: Southern Jewish Resource Network for Gender & Sexual Diversity reflects on year 5776 5776 has been a very difficult year. Immediately after the Supreme Court’s decision to make marriage equality the law, there was a backlash with 200 legislative bills spread across the country proposing to discriminate against lesbian, […]
Robbie Medwed, Education Director of SOJOURN, criticizes Rabbi Herzfeld for showing solidarity with the LGBT community by visiting a gay bar: “If you want to stand with the LGBTQ community now, and I sincerely hope you do, go to vigils and speak out against bigotry and hatred, especially in your own congregations.” In the early […]
Congregation Bet Haverim celebrated three decades as Atlanta’s first gay and lesbian synagogue with a multimedia presentation about its origins. The occasion is a bittersweet reminder for Michael McNeir-Clark, the only survivor of the shul’s four original founders. “Increasingly during the 1980s, there was a growing sense of urgency: Don’t whine; fix it. Don’t put […]
Atlanta’s Temple Sinai member Andy Bauman, who represents Sandy Springs’ 6th District on the City Council, is proud of the decade-old city’s record of nondiscrimination, and he doesn’t want to see that position change in light of House Bill 757, the religious liberty legislation the Georgia General Assembly last week sent to Gov. Nathan Deal. H.B. […]
A religious freedom bill described by opponents as being discriminatory against same-sex couples passed the Georgia state legislature on Wednesday night. The Georgia General Assembly sent religious liberty legislation to Gov. Nathan Deal on Wednesday night, March 16, outraging the LGBT community and its supporters and renewing warnings from the business community of the economic […]
Though America has made incredible strides toward a more inclusive society since same-sex couples nationwide gained the freedom to marry last June, anti-LGBT discrimination is alive and well. Rabbi Berg has been witness to it year after year, in three Temples, across three states—Texas, New Jersey, and now Georgia. For eight years, Rabbi Peter Berg […]
Georgia Equality Executive Director Jeff Graham is receiving Southern Jewish Resource Network for Gender and Sexual Diversity (SOJOURN)’s Kinsler Rainmaker Award. One of the leaders of the Georgia opposition to the proposed First Amendment Defense Act and other legislation related to the tabled Religious Freedom Restoration Act is Jeff Graham, the executive director of Georgia […]
The Anti-Defamation League’s Southeast Region office in Buckhead quickly responded to Rev. Franklin Graham who called for living according to the Christian Bible and with criticism of same-sex marriage, transgender rights and abortion. ADL decried the remarks by the son of evangelist Billy Graham. “While Mr. Graham is entitled to express his opinion on same-sex marriage and transgender […]
“The first time I considered going to the mikveh was before my wedding. While this was a completely typical time to think about going to the mikveh, I was marrying a woman, not a man, and I identify as queer.” – Jessica Ozar, a freelance writer from Atlanta, blogs. Jessica on her wedding day (Photo: Twitter) I didn’t […]