Message From Our Rabbi

Shalom Dear Members and Friends,

You are invited
Join our community in the Kol Ami sanctuary for High Holy Days services. We will form a deeper connection to the Divine through inspirational prayer, chanting, meditation, story telling, dancing and drumming. Our small congregation creates an intimate environment in which we nurture our relationships with G!d and each other.

We also invite you to joyfully experience the spirit of our desert ancestors in our beautiful Sukah, "the best in North America!" Special guest rabbis and teachers will lead a variety of celebrations.

New Year Spiritual Practices
As we prepare for the New Year, we count forty days from Rosh Khodesh Elul (August 14) until Yom Kippur. The Rabbis teach that if we devote ourselves daily during this time, we can consciously create the changes in our lives to do teshuvah, to be at-one-ment. During these days of introspection, we:
 

• mend broken relationships with family and friends and to ask for forgiveness
• increase our efforts by giving tzedakah, (charity), doing acts of righteousness and praying for the Holy Blessed One to support us on our journey.
• blast the shofar (the ram’s horn) every day to awaken our souls. Visit www.ruach.org to hear the sounds of the shofar.
• do not say bad things about another person.
 

"As you want G!d to give you a chance, give everyone else a chance to also begin again."
- Reb Shlomo Carlebach z'l
 

Who is Ruach Hamidbar?
A safe space for every Jew, Ruach Hamidbar welcomes all who seek meaning in their lives. We are child friendly, singles friendly, convert friendly, GLBTQ friendly and G!d friendly!

We serve the “growing edge” of the Jewish world by drawing from the wellsprings of our beautiful, ancient tradition.

"The core of any mature tree is old wood. The old wood is crucial to maintaining the tree's structure, its ability to withstand the changing winds, but no growth is going on there. The living processes that are the growth of the tree, its message to the future, take place only in the tree's newest and outermost ring."
- Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi
 

Contact us
I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to contact me and Ruach at 602-420-1700 or rabbi@ruach.org.

May we each be blessed with an open heart to forgiveness, love and compassion for ourselves and each other.

Shannah Tovah U’metukah,
A Happy and Sweet New Year,

Rabbi Ayla Grafstein
Rabbi@ruach.org
 

Ruach Board