The future of Jewish women and religious freedom explored in upcoming summit
“What we are advocating for is a genuinely inclusive American society, which is guaranteed in the Constitution.”
A summit on the post-election landscape — and how women can mobilize to create change — is slated for Dec. 15, 1 to 4 p.m., at Rodef Shalom Congregation in Oakland.
“Jewish Women and Religious Freedom in Pittsburgh: What Comes Next?” is sponsored by the Jewish Women’s Foundation of Greater Pittsburgh, with underwriting by trustee Nancy Weissman in memory of her mother-in-law, trustee Jacquelin Wechsler.
“This type of work was important to Jacquelin,” Judy Cohen, JWF’s executive director, said. “She believed in educating women about issues and about becoming advocates to effect change.”
Organized by grantee partner Jews for a Secular Democracy, the non-partisan gathering invites women, people of marginalized genders and their allies to explore the future of religious freedom and related topics, including antisemitism, reproductive rights, gender equality, LGBTQ+ rights and public education.
The summit is the culminating, and only in-person, event in a series of webinars held this year.
Pennsylvania Superior Court Judge Jill Beck will deliver the keynote speech on laws around religious freedom. She also will moderate a panel discussion featuring Cantor Kalix Jacobson of Temple Emanuel of South Hills; Jackie Perlow, supervising attorney of the Women’s Law Project; Kathleen Blee, distinguished professor of sociology at the University of Pittsburgh; and Carrie Wardzinski, a Pittsburgh-area organizer for the politically progressive group Red Wine & Blue.
“This conference is a way to bring people together to talk about current challenges to religious freedom and to connect the dots with other issues threatened by Christian nationalism and Project 2025,” said Paul Golin, executive director of the Society for Humanistic Judaism, which developed the Jews for a Secular Democracy initiative.
“What I hope comes out of it is that attendees participating in breakout sessions will want to connect on the ground and work at the local level to make change,” he said. “What we are advocating for is a genuinely inclusive American society, which is guaranteed in the Constitution.”
Organization-specific action tables ranging from Congregation Dor Hadash and Squirrel Hill Stands Against Gun Violence to YWCA of Greater Pittsburgh will enable participants to find the “wheelhouse” that interests them, said Alliyson Feldmann, a national storyteller for Planned Parenthood who served as a panelist on the project’s webinar concerning reproductive rights and religious freedom earlier this year.
She is a member of the steering committee which designed and guided the summit.
“We started planning what our final push would be back in August with no idea what state the country would be in post-election, and what would be meaningful regardless of the outcome,” Feldmann said, noting that overarching themes will include fighting disinformation propagated by Christian nationalists and inspiring attendees to pursue activism.
“Activism can take many forms,” she said, “like speaking truth, getting people to register to vote, getting them to the polls, signing up for a newsletter and making a donation.”
A female-centric summit reflects the crucial role of women as leaders in advocacy and action, Feldmann added.
“I have done a lot of work in the nonprofit and politically-leaning spaces and the vast majority of people are women,” she said. “We get the job done, we are used to building communities and working cooperatively.
“The spaces we occupy are so multi-dimensional we have the most opportunity to effect change. We are involved in all aspects of life.”
Women are becoming increasingly politically engaged in advocacy and the judicial process, observed Beck, who is one of 12 female judges elected to the 14-member Pennsylvania Superior Court.
“It has been a slow progression for women to come into their own in leadership in politics, the judiciary and advocacy roles, and it is wonderful that people are recognizing and embracing it,” she said.
Since religious freedom is the pivotal summit topic, Beck indicated that she is looking forward, as keynote speaker, to the opportunity to enlighten people on separation of church and state, “a very complicated area of the law.”
She is hopeful, she said, that attendees “will come away with a better understanding of religion clauses, what they mean and how they are interpreted, and with some measure of hope.”
The unique challenges confronting Jewish people of marginalized genders in an ideologically conservative climate will be explored in a panel discussion that includes Jacobson, the first non-binary cantor in Temple Emanuel’s history.
“The Jewish LGBTQ+ community is pretty robust and women in that community are aligned in the struggles they face, like those related to medical care and mental health treatment,” Jacobson said.
Jacobson, 28, was among the youngest cantors in their class at Hebrew Union College’s Debbie Friedman School of Sacred Music, and part of the first cantorial class to include transgender students.
“A lot of LGBTQ+ people are looking for community,” Jacobson said, “and Judaism has a rich history as a harboring refuge for people of marginalized genders.
“Part of my position as a clergy person in Pittsburgh is to be a repository of knowledge for those who don’t know so much about the trans or non-binary community, and as long as people are being respectful I am happy to answer their questions.”
Jacobson said that while they “cannot speak for the entire LGBTQ+ community,” having been openly part of it for more than half their life, they are “humbled” by the opportunity the summit is providing to enlighten others.
More information and registration for the summit can be found at jfasd.org/pittsburgh-conference-december-2024/. PJC
Deborah Weisberg is a freelance writer living in Pittsburgh.
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