Rabbi Mira Rivera discusses her chaplaincy to Jews of Color, while also reflecting on her own experiences as a Filipina-American Jewish woman.
Rabbi Mira Rivera is the first Filipina-American woman to receive rabbinic ordination at The Jewish Theological Seminary. She is Rabbi-in-Residence nationally with The LUNAR Collective, a Gen-Z founded organization by and for Asian American Jews. She also serves as Rabbi-In-Residence at JCC Harlem with a mission of growing an in-person Shabbat community of learners, daveners, and organizers that is truly welcoming to those who have been on the margins. Among numerous accolades, Rabbi Rivera was named by the New York Jewish Week in 2023 as one of “36 to Watch” for contributions in the arts, religion, culture, business, politics, and philanthropy. She was a recipient of the 2023 Rabbinic Human Rights Hero Award from T’ruah.
Rabbi Rivera is a Board Certified Chaplain and a member of Neshama: Association of Jewish Chaplains.
Additional Resources:
Chai Chats with Rabbi Mira Rivera
The Jewish-Asian Film Project of The Lunar Collective
Racism in the Jewish Community: The Uncomfortable Truth, Ilana Kaufman ELI Talk
The Largest Study Ever of Jews of Color. What Did It Find?
Edward Bernstein: Welcome to NeshamaCast, brought to you by Neshama, the Association of Jewish Chaplains. I’m your host, Rabbi Ed Bernstein.
In recent years the recognition of Jews of Color as a substantial percentage of the American Jewish community has gained greater traction in our mostly white presenting mainstream Jewish organizations. Today on NeshamaCast, our guest is uniquely positioned to help us understand the community of Jews of Color, and how Jewish chaplains can effectively serve this vital segment of the broader Jewish community.
Rabbi Mira Rivera is the first Filipina American woman to receive Rabbinic ordination at the Jewish Theological Seminary. She is Rabbi in residence with the lunar collective, a GenZ. founded organisation by and for Asian American Jews. She also serves as Rabbi in residence at JCC Harlem, in New York City, with a mission of growing an in-person Shabbat community of learners, davenners, and organizers that is truly welcoming to those who have been on the margins. Among numerous accolades. Rabbi Rivera was named by the New York Jewish Week in 2023 as one of 36, to watch for contributions in the arts, religion, culture, business, politics, and philanthropy. Rabbi Rivera is also a board-certified chaplain, and is a member of Neshama Association of Jewish Chaplains. Rabbi Mira Rivera welcome to NeshamaCast. It is such an honor to have you.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: Thank you so much. I am amongst my own.
Edward Bernstein: Rabbi Rivera. I've asked all of our guests on NeshamaCast to share a bit about their back story and the path that led them to their professional work. In your case your origin story is closely intertwined with the work. That is the focus of your Rabbinate and chaplaincy. Could you please start by talking about where you grew up, your family of origin, and any spiritual and religious foundations that you built on later on in your adulthood.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: Yes, thank you. I was born in Detroit, Michigan and my parents were both immigrants. My father had been in the United States decades before my mom and he
was born in the Philippines during the time when the Philippines was still underneath American rule. So, you know, following the Spanish American war, like Americans, came to the Philippines, so, as an 18 year old he joined the navy there. There were 3 bases American bases there at that time. And you know. So he was a working Filipino person who became naturalized in the United States, and after the Navy was an engineer. Decades later my mom came from the Philippines. She received, she had received a scholarship from the Johns Hopkins University, already a young doctor in public health. That was her focus. And somehow these 2 people who would never have met because of their generational difference, and even socioeconomic difference in the Philippines was just big and they met and they married, and here I there was. But like a lot of immigrant families they looked at one child that they that came into their lives, a child in their later years, and they thought best that I should grow up amongst our own people, with lots of relatives and aunts and a lot of you know a lot of terrain and gardens, you know, to frolicking, and I was sent to the Philippines with my with my grandma. So I think even that part of understanding the immigrant story and the empathy to displaced people really was from my own origin store, as you said and being an American citizen, I was what you would call over there, going to school there an undocumented person, because I'd come in on a tourist visa. So every time I would go back to the United States to visit my mom and my dad. Somehow, I would get into a problem with immigration there like they would say, what are you doing here? She's, you know, this a person who is a tourist going to school here, and in the same story of the undocumented folks who are here brought to America, or cross the borders as children or as infants.
By the time it was time to go to college. That's when even their gates said, You have to leave and because it was also Marshall law there you know where people were being shot for demonstrations! And it was really dangerous at that time. By then my father had come back to the Philippines, and he was this foreigner right, having left the Philippines as an 18 year old. Now he was back there, and we were both the blind leading the blind. I was a kid, and he didn't know the ways of the country, and we both decided. Alas! I should go back to the US.
I came back went to school what was supposed to go to school, but I went to India first, and this was part of my journey. I ended up studying in Banaras, and then in Kolkata, and following a Master’s.
Very early on I became a meditation teacher. I guess, in a position that we would describe as a principiant. How do you say? An aspirant really to full monkhood and part of my work was to travel around the world and teach women meditation, and that followed certain rules of that are in many ways akin to Jewish orthodox rules about relationships with the opposite sex. And I just so I taught women. That was my, that was my mandate. Community organizing, I guess, was what we would call what I was doing. I found myself posted to the Middle East, and you know, with Israel as the place for R. And R. In one of my off times, when I was not teaching, when I said, Okay, Mira, you work so hard. You're always at it. You're in Jerusalem. Go and
I found myself on the Mount of Olives one day, and it was around evening. It was time for meditation, early afternoon, late afternoon, evening, and I found a spot
to sit and meditate, and when I finish meditating, I opened my eyes, and I was there looking at the Dome of the Rock, and I thought hmm! I should go over to the old city, not knowing you know what I would encounter. And the next day I did. And I saw the Kotel. I saw the mechitza, the divider of the whole courtyard. One side. The men were praying, the women were praying, and I totally understood that. And those days the chairs were right up at the divider in the women's side, and the women were praying up against the wall, and all I wanted to do really was like, go to the wall and just like embrace. You know, like I was. I felt like this strong pull.
But I knew, I said, you know, Mira, you know you understand this. You are not of their people, but you can sit by the divider I sat. I you know I had modest clothing already, as it were. I had a head covering, as it were, and I sat there, and I just closed my eyes to do again my afternoon, early evening meditation and all I did was cry. I just wept and wept, and until there were no more tears to come out, and that really was pivotal for me. But all I knew was I had. I had. I felt like I had come home and the corollary to with the after the aftermath was, I thought: Okay, what do you have to do now? I knew I had to end what I was doing. I knew I had to come home and fix the rupture that I had inherited from my parents. My parents were no longer together and to get to know my mom.
Edward Bernstein: Was your family of origin, or is your family Catholic?
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: So what I understood was, my father was Catholic, right? So I didn't grow up with them. I didn't grow up with my parents. I was raised by my grandmother, my maternal grandma, and in our house there were no Catholic icons. I mean, the Philippines is a 80% Catholic country, and I was sent to a Catholic parochial school. But our house had nothing which was already curious, and there were anomalies. My grandma didn't go to church when there would be campaigns to pray the rosary, she made a lot of noise and was disruptive, and she would leave, and I would hear: Oh, your grandma is Hudio. Hudio was Spanish, Spanish was the second, third language of the Philippines and it meant she's a Jew. And I thought it was you know, hateful because the way they said it often was accompanied with a pinch or an arm grab and a hiss. But what I didn't understand then was they were actually telling me: your grandmother is Jewish. And I will not understand that until I applied for Rabbinical School.
Edward Bernstein: Tell more about that. This is fascinating.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: , I was a New York person, I came back to the Us. I said, you know, went to school. I was on California, and I danced also.
Edward Bernstein: Your biography says that you found your way to the Rabbinate through dance, so I hope you can weave that in as well.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: Oh, for real! So when I was in the Middle East, so during that time I was in Jerusalem, so during that period I would travel. I was in Jordan one time, and you know the US. Embassy would offer free movies, and free , opportunities to learn for expats. And I saw this coffee table book, photographs of Martha Graham dancing and it was by Barbara Morgan. And I remember looking at photographs, hardly any text, only photographs. I looked at it, and I said: This looks like prayer. Can you dance prayer? I had been exposed to dance when I was a teenager. I danced folk dance. I did some ballet and that became that became like a calling again for me. So when I returned to the United States I started to dance, and I found myself eventually the dance company that I worked with, knew the Martha Graham Dance Company principals, and when the company came to San Diego, There we were, and I saw it from the balcony, from the cheap seats my whole company were watching, and I said, this looks like prayer, and I was so drawn. So I came to New York. But I really wanted to dance for Graham at the Graham school and there was one choreographer named Pearl Lance. So Pearl was Jewish. She had her own company, and she had pieces that she had choreographed called Tehillim (Psalms), Sephardic women, and she was working on this opus called Dybbuk and with my story from Israel, you know, I remember coming, going to her and saying, can I dance for you? And she said, Oh, Mira, you're a noodle. I was. I was not strong. I was very slight of body. But a Japanese American woman, choreographer, and register for Martha took me under her wing, her name Zuricho Kikuchi of blessed memory, and the conductor of the orchestra that would play for the Graham Company was my neighbor, and they were my mentors. Pearl Lang, when I I finally told her my story, she said, Mary, you should, write it down.
And many years later, when I I was thinking of the Rabbinate I told her, Pearl, I'm studying to be a Rabbi, and there's a cantor who used to dance for Toila Tharp. He's in the same school, I know somebody, I think, who used to dance for Paul Taylor Boston ballet, and she stopped me. We were walking, crossing the street in the middle of Broadway, stood there in the middle on the island, and she said, You will touch a lot of people this way, Mira. And she gave me a blessing, so I, said Pearl, can I pass this on to any other dancer who's going into the Rabbinate? And she said, Yes, my dear.
Edward Bernstein: That's amazing. And so now I'd like to connect the dots you started talking about the Jewish heritage of your grandmother, how did you learn about that? And how did you integrate that into your identity as you were coming into Jewish observance and the Rabbinate.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: Really, if I had not applied to Rabbinical school, to a Rabbinical program, and this was initially at AJR, nobody all those years nobody ever asked me, and even I remembered voicing actually saying to some clergy that my family came from Spain in the 1870s, when the Suez Canal opened, several just kind of brushed it away, let's change the subject.. But when I applied for the Academy for Jewish religion, the admissions Rabbi at that time said: tell me more. Those 3 words tell me more. Tell me more about what you know of the journey of your ancestors that came from Spain. And then he said particularly, what do you remember about the food? And I said, oh, a lot.
Because, you know, I was the only one amongst our cousins who was really interested in what was going on in the kitchen. So when I was not in school on the weekend, I would go to the kitchen and see what our aunt was preparing. I told this story to the Rabbi, and he said: But did you see? So I explained how we prepared chicken for a meal. Our cooks would go to the market and buy live chickens and bring them home like 1 one hand here, one hand, the area like holding the legs and flapping. And I watched. And so, as I was describing the process, he said, You know that shochting (slaughtering) I said to them, I said to Rabbi Meir, you know our cousins in Israel said that they told me this because once I related the story they said, Mira, you’re Sephardi. That's why you have such passion with Judaism. It's your passion, it is unbridled. It's just because you are of Sephardi roots. And at that time I said, Oh, I'm so really just fine! Being a ger.
Edward Bernstein: Ger being a convert. You had gone through a formal conversion process but still you have this, this background that you're uncovering.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: So this Rabbi Meir, who was, you know, in interviewing me for the Mechina (perpatory) program of AJR said: what do you remember about the cooking? I said a lot. He said: Write it down so. So it's something I know in my heart.
And then eventually the details started to come out once because of Rabbi Aria Meir, and I say his name with just such respect and such love that he was curious enough, and he plied his his knowledge of Jewish history and he gave me that opening. So people approach to me for conversion.They're inquiring, and I am more curious about the broader story. Because of my experience. As a Rabbi. Now I can. I have, I would, what I would call a gift of curiosity so that I can help the person approaching me uncover their story, uncover, like the longings behind the longing, \ one of my chaplain mentors Rabbi Nathan Goldberg, he would always say to me, what is their need? But behind the need, what is their hope, and what are their resources? So I would always look for that.
Edward Bernstein: So I want to fast forward into your current day work and I'll set the stage with this. I mean, it's today is we're speaking. It's May sixth. A few days ago on May first I went into my office at Boca Raton Regional Hospital and I turned on my computer. And these reminders popped up on my computer calendar and it said that the month of May was both Jewish American Heritage month, and Asian and Pacific Islanders heritage month. The people who designate special themes for each month have historical reasons for doing so, but the convergence of both this month is striking because you embody both of those themes. Can you talk about that? And also specifically about what you do with the Lunar Collective? What Lunar Collective is as an organization, why it exists and what you do to support the people in the organization.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: The confluence of events right. The confluence of these commemorations is just a gift for us in general. I sense that when people look at us, or people who are not of their ethnicity, like we often are looking at definitely at the at the other or they all look alike, or there's somehow this blurring of who we are. And I actually sense that even as not even focusing on us. The chaplaincy that I learned, and that continue to be dedicated to practicing has been a gift in bridging that right in bridging that tendency that people that we have to not go into the difficult of who the other person is. In 2019, the origins of origins of Lunar really start, you know, came from 2 young people, Jenna, Rudolph and Jens Lossberg, who called each other, both from different campuses in California, checking in with each other and asking each other, Are you the only one like me in your campus? And eventually they said, Let's put together a message on social media. Let's see how many of us are out there. They thought 5 would answer. About 50 people answered. And out of that grew a artistic team that put together a Youtube series called the Jewish Asian Film Project. They got some funding from that for that. Basically, it was young and older, you know, and elder Jews who identified also as Asian, talking about being Asian, and food and Jewish ritual but placed and crafted together in a colorful, spicy, and well edited and engaging way that became for me a revelation. And I saw people like me. And I saw young people who look like my own children.
So 2020, the pandemic started. I was working at a synagogue on the upper West Side called Romemu. We no longer had services in person at that time and soon enough the world, our world, I would say, our world, the world of those who identify or are identified as people of color exploded with the murder of George Floyd and Brianna Taylor, and living here in New York City, I would run services by my window and down below me Amsterdam Avenue is where, like the ambulances would go, would pass by through the day and night. And marches. There were marches, black lives matter marches, happening around that time and during that time there was a call for all of us who identified as people of color to speak. And by then, 2020, I have already been connected to this kind of a fledgeling network but there was also a call for us who were not black to support black and brown liberation and to fight against white supremacy. At that time more and more than the work I was speaking, I also saw my place as the work for listening where others were out in the streets. I also had to be available to listen to all of us from all stripes.
Moving into 2021, there were the beginning of 2,021 saw attacks on Asians all over America. We were being smacked with 2 by 4 s in New York City, people were being Asians were being attacked in subways, pushed onto off of subway platforms. So I myself, as a woman of a certain age I was worried, but and but it was during that time that the Asian Jews started to reach out to each other.
It was actually during the attacks in Atlanta that we came together with the Shabbaton online, and eventually I eventually stayed with them. I stayed with them for Passover, virtual Passover events, and other such gatherings and eventually I joined them as their as a Rabbi in residence. So I do pastoral care work with them. I have we have what we call a Chai chat, which can be a study session, and it could be also like a pastoral one on one in person or on zoom.. That's what we do these days.
Edward Bernstein: I love the play on words because chai is spelled CHAI, meaning life in Hebrew.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: Isn’t that great?
Edward Bernstein: it's a great synergy there. And it's an interesting development from what you described earlier in your adulthood when you described encountering other Asian Jewish people in synagogue, and you were reluctant, or there was a a sort of an assumption that you couldn't talk about your shared heritage in synagogue. And now we're at a point where there's lunar where that's the expressed purpose to come together and to embrace that identity.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: You got it! Exactly so we would say it's an affinity group we would have would have a Seder book. Clubs, gatherings, and people would see each other, and that so, being in person was really crucial for us, I had also been involved in Jews of Color, learning first in person and then becoming virtual. But there was for us there was more. There was more impetus, I think, to get back and meeting in person than just a study group because isolation crippled everyone.
Edward Bernstein: Yeah. Rabbi Rivera, you are a board-certified chaplain, as am I and many of our listeners, and you and I both went through extensive training of clinical pastoral education. CPE. I know in several of the units of CPE that I took, we had didactics, you know, presentations about microaggressions and that was towards us as chaplains being trained to be welcoming and inclusive of all. I'm wondering if you could define what microaggressions are, and what's particularly what I've been working on in just my own personal life and chaplaincy is confronting microaggressions that exist within the Jewish community and trying to mitigate that. So I'm curious about examples of microaggressions that you have received specifically within the Jewish community over the years. And what's different about a Jew of color, experiencing a microaggression from within the Jewish community as to as opposed to the broader white society.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: One example that stands in my mind stands out in my mind is one timethere was an event in a synagogue. It wasn't that was not a service in particular, but it was a commemoration and I remembered getting there early with my spouse who's not Asian presenting and we found a seat beside other. You know, other couples that we knew, and I remembered I was pregnant at that time. The other mom was also pregnant. Right? So we would sit near it. We would sit together and as people started filling in filling the room, a woman came and she was going to sit beside me. That was, those were the empty seats, and she saw me, and she was very, very upset that I was there and so there was a little kerfuffle and then I was told. Oh, she's a holocaust survivor, and I thought first of all an elder. You know I would like I would always give up my seat an elder? like no questions asked but I remember there were empty seats so I didn't understand like what the problem was. And then I understood.
I didn't learn about microaggressions during didactics. So at the time when I was doing CPE,
these things were not really there. There was no term for it. In fact, what I actually found was the reverse. The reverse was in CPE, because in all our placements we were an integrated team. There were people from all of all racial ethnicities in the play, our places of work, and in fact, my first preceptor was a Buddhist monk. I think that was actually the beginning of my own understanding of like who I was, the unique being that I was, and it turned out that this gentleman completely knew the dance world, because he also was partnered with a New York City ballet dancer, right principal dancer. And there we were. We were both somehow in the dance world, and he understood that where I came from such a deep level.
What do I fight? What do I always meet. Need! It continues to this day. But there are ways now that I've learned how to protect myself and also help other people like me. For example, if I am going to be invited to speak somewhere, I make double sure with my hosts and I tell them it is important that you let the guards know that an Asian person is going to be coming earlier. Because you know I want to show up early, and please give my name. Please give my ethnicity, and my guarantee to you is I will have my ID. I know this from experience, from being stopped, from being searched. And I say this to them with just with all love in my heart, so we can avoid awkwardness and to avoid embarrassment on anyone. So I learned this very early on, and that has helped me. When I enter spaces where I am not known.
Edward Bernstein: That's a helpful tool for you to manage personally, but it seems like an unfair burden for you to have to think about all that in advance, whereas a white presenting person like me doesn't even think about those things.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: Absolutely, and I think my first introduction to that which for me made total sense, was visiting a synagogue. You have to write in advance, get a letter of introduction from your Rabbi, I mean, and all those things, and I was fine with that, but the other side of it, you know, there was just too much pain and just repetitions of the same thing again and again that I just said, Look, I'm managing up. There you go.
Edward Bernstein: Yeah, I could feel through our zoom connection the palpable pain of that moment of the elderly Jewish woman who would not sit next to you, and how that was what we now understand as a as a micro aggression. I've heard from other friends and colleagues who are Jews of Color, that there are certain specific microaggressions that are experienced within the Jewish community, like people coming up to say an Asian American person, and saying, Are you Jewish, or when did you convert, or something like that? So I'm wondering if you can unpack that dynamic, and what are ways in which white presenting Jews, in quote unquote mainstream Jewish institutions can be more sensitized and really embody inclusion and welcome.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella Bag searches should be should be equal across the board.
Edward Bernstein: And I should just, I should just add, we're in a day and age where it's becoming more of the norm to have more extensive security at synagogue prior to services. It's unfortunately a product of our age right now wasn't always the case. So security, I think, is one major manifestation. It's the first meeting point when people first step into space. So let's say, after security, you're in the sanctuary you already described one situation. Whether it's in a service, or at Kiddush, or a preschool family or parent event. What are some things that we should be aware of in those situations?
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: I wish that people would think that if this person has been cleared through all of that security that they have a reason for being there. That when we're there we didn't wander in there because of a mistake. And I've heard this before. People that would be usually as guests will be told. Oh, the entrance to the shelter is over there. I think one of the ways we teach really is by showing nonverbal cues. Our community doesn’t necessarily listen to the words that we say. alas! We craft our words. We work so hard on our messaging but what they look at is how we behave, how we function in ritual and holy space. And when they see us behave a certain way towards those who are often marginalized, marginalized. They see that I think, more than the words that we then that would just come out of our mouths. I believe that makes a big difference, and the community leaders who say that they've had some modicum of success towards creating such an environment have said that they themselves would stand there, come early to help welcome people, model for the Shabbat greeters how to do this.
Edward Bernstein: You touched on or you touched on the anniversary of George Floyd and the protests in the aftermath 4 years ago. I want to revisit that. So when this episode drops in late May, we will mark the fourth anniversary of the George Floyd protests that were a watershed moment in America. Can you take us back into that time? And the impact, in particular, on the Jews of Color community.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: One of the first campaigns of allyship that I would describe as allyship was a one program called, Say their Names. This happened in the New York area and I remember because now we were all on, you know, in virtual land. JOC Leaders whom I knew we would come together, and we would just share like how like everybody was tapped out. Everybody was being asked, please talk about this. Please talk about that. Write this, write that, and everyone was exhausted and really overstretched.
And I remember during that time that there was also this sense, to what end. What is the end of this? Is it for for our Jewish allies to be able to post that they took care of it right, or is this a beginning of a conversation? So I myself. right when I was approached, because there was there was like a limit right? There was a limit. At the same time I was being I was continuing to be, you know, an associate Rabbi in the synagogue that I was in, some of our clergy had to move outside town and there was some in very minimal in person, but there was just stuff that needed to happen. Services had to continue morning minyan had to continue. It was initiative that I started at that community during Covid times and then, on top of that we had to do all this other work like granted. But we were burning out, totally burning out, and I pleaded. I pleaded, especially when it was when the attacks on Asians were happening. I said: You're my allies. Please write something. What do I want? What do I request? You're asking me to do this work? This what we need, I said. What we need is conversations with you, my, you know, fellow Rabbis, and we can do this on Zoom. We can do this in a webinar, but we need to know each other. Because, believe me, I said, in the next couple of weeks something else was will happen, and we will ask for the same letter of you know of protest or a letter of support for us. But we are not getting to know each other. I said, After a while I just said, No. you say something. And this what we need. We need to get to know each other. We need to start building relationships amongst us. This is not a waste of time. We were privileged to be in the Rabbinical Assembly Conservative movement, first Racial justice pilgrimage a couple of months ago to Montgomery, Alabama, and to Mobile, Alabama and to Louisiana and our colleagues raised the importance of building allyship with other faiths in our communities. And again I pleaded, I said, we need relationships amongst us, too, inside our movement, inside our Jewish affinity groups, inside Neshama.
Edward Bernstein: With the goal of what?
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: With the goal of knowing that I can talk to someone who's Asian American. I can talk to someone who's African, American, who's like one of us who's like one of us from benign curiosity because we are in this together for the long haul, not just October 7. But the racial you know, divide, and the anti-Americanism that’s in our country, and the raising of phantoms and ghosts so that we would fear each other. This the long haul.
Edward Bernstein: Yeah. So I wanna go back to what you alluded to you. You and I recently had an opportunity to travel together. We both serve on the Social Justice Commission of the Rabbinical Assembly and other arms of the of Conservative Judaism which sponsored a leadership mission to the Southern United States to learn about the legacy of slavery and systemic racism in this country. Why did you go on this trip? And what were key takeaways for you?
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: I went on this trip because I wanted to find who are my allies within my movement within my seminary. I wanted to meet you all face to face through Rabbi Amy Eilsberg's efforts and the Rabbinical this subcommittee for over a year we would meet each other on Zoom, but I wanted to see face to face who you all were. And I wanted to learn again more about the history of slavery. It was also bit of a pilgrimage for me. I wanted to see that one like one installation in at the Equity Justice Museum, that talked about several installations that talked about the prohibition against marriage between a white American and a black of an African American or with a Latino person, a person who was who they called Spanish at that time in those in those statutes, and also against what they called Mongols and those of Asiatic origin.
When I saw that for the first time I remembered finally understanding why my father never married all those years. He was single until he met my mom because there was this prohibition, and I saw the States where those prohibitions were law and then I understood why they lived where they lived even though that those prohibitions may have become you know, less enforced. But I can understand my father coming to this country and hearing that, and just always preferring to be with other people of color, because that was allowed. They're allowed to live together in rooming homes, or to be to be in community but not with white folks, white presenting people.
The work of racial justice is understanding the roots of racism and power struggle in our country, and it is important that, to my understanding that as we Jewish professionals and clergy have dedicated our lives to learning our texts and continue to learn our texts that we should also understand the history of the land that we are living in in the Diaspora, particularly this country. So it is important for me, as an American, as a person living residing in this country to understand this history that hasn't been spoken of so freely. It is not DEI work. It is understanding history but what this country was founded on . It is also, I believe crucial to understand that that particular history becomes transferred, is transferred to all other waves of immigration in this country, including the Jews, including my own people, people that have come from Southeast Asia, far East Asia, from other lands and that all of that is conflated on this history that we started to try to explore down in Louisiana and in Alabama.
So for us to be Rabbis, and not understand that history, I think, is a little bit is a little shortsighted. Back to my own personal experience of that Rabbi Aryeh Meirconnecting his understanding of medieval history And diasporas. You know from the Iberian peninsula and global history in American history, thatt I could start to even look at my own legacy that was, that's exemplary. So we live in our world, our Jewish world embrace am Yisrael (the people of Israel) , and we live here and we embrace And try to understand this history too, as well.
Edward Bernstein: It was an eye-opening trip in so many ways, and I'm so honored that I got to travel with you and several other Jews of Color from within the leadership of our movement. It was it was that we were doing both external work, learning about the larger systems of racism in the country, but also doing internal work to bring about stronger relations within our own community. And that's something that touches me greatly.
Edward Bernstein: Yeah. I'd like to get into your work at the JCC of Harlem. What do you bring to this work as a chaplain? And in particularly in particular, if you can share specific anecdotes about how your presence as a Rabbi and chaplain has enhanced the lives of the community you serve.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: For me. The dictum of Tell me More is really, you know, is part of my mantra. Tell me more, I say to the families that have been going there for many years. So this was a phenomenon of Jewish families moving to Harlem, at least in my time as when I was raising my when we were raising our children, I remembered in the in the early nineties we heard people saying, Oh, now is a good time to move to Harlem, now it's a good time to buy. Now is a good time to rent. And there were people that did move there and then now their children are getting are getting older, and more families are moving with reality. Families are moving there. So my, a lot of the work that I do particularly with many families that are of multiracial ethnicities together is to find a way for them to say to each other: I have this place. I have a place that's my affinity place. I may choose to belong to any of the synagogues that are adjacent. But also here's this place where our Hebrew school or independent Hebrew school program has tracked that about 40% of our families are multiracial families, so a place where their parents would not get the same reaction that I received. You know when I asked, may I be connected to that other family and to be told, oh, we don't out people, but here we are, but at least there's a place where they can be seen, And feel that they can walk in because we facilitate this.
Edward Bernstein: What has this year been like at JCC Harlem? Given the situation in Israel specifically, what are you observing among the people and the families you serve, and who may feel torn between different ideological positions. And how are you providing ministry of presence to them? And how are you taking care of yourself during this time of upheaval. I mean, we just witnessed what was going on at Columbia University and CUNY. I'm sure this had an effect on the people you serve so. What have you been observing and experiencing in the field?
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella : When, October 7, when the massacre had just happened. It happened to be the morning of Shimini Atzeret for us and to sing hallel or not to sing Hallel, right? That was like the our first of our first challenge was, What do you do? And so the psalms of thanksgiving, we say. And we said, Yes, so happened. We were also celebrating a child who will have a first haircut around that same time. And we said, Yes, we celebrate because our community is in front of us, and we celebrate. Our first gathering with families who had relatives in Israel or Israeli families. I remembered one of the one of the family said, Oh, this like a Shiva, and it was like a Shiva. We set up the chairs so that we could all face the, the common space where the kids were at play and we gave presents to each other and eventually there were people who stopped coming and there were people who kept coming. But we noticed that it became lonely because people were afraid of us being a Jewish Community Center in Harlem, they were afraid of being in a space that was Jewish period and the way we are constructed is, you know we have clear windows.We are like a storefront on a side street. And people were notably afraid. So the community started baking, started making challot right, like kind of like a version of Kinneret so that, unbaked, we would first, you know, make the dough and all this, And braid it, And bring it to bring it to families. Just knock on their doors. Bring it to them. If they're not coming, we'll bring the challot to them. We sang, we continued our services. I guess that's what we did and people are starting to come again but one by one we call people you know, ministry of presence. We just check on each other but it's been lonely. We had a constituency that was decidedly left progressive left for October seventh, and some of them don't come. But what's good, though, is that some people still reach out and that's all I can hope for. All I can hope for is, let's not forget any of the goodwill that we had before.
The JCC is a pro-Israel organization.So those who actually safer have this this idea that a person of color would naturally be anti-Israel. I mean, all of these are part of the pitfalls and the dangerous places that we can go with, simplifying relationships or commitments to being Jewish. For me the most sobering tool that I have is actually chaplaincy. I am public but I cannot be that public, you know, because I need to be able to be a person that can be there for people rather than you know cultivating a public persona.
Edward Bernstein: Yeah. Well, just to follow up our NJC President Rabbanit Alyssa Thomas Newborn. recently interviewed Reverend Kenneth Ulmer, who's a prominent African American Baptist minister, and it was part of NAJC series. Let's talk. Interfaith voices on Israel and you can catch that episode here in the NeshamaCast feed Bishop Ulmer that was asked by Rabbanit Alyssa about African American perspectives on the Israel Palestinian conflict, and he explained that within the African American community. There's a natural predilection to side with the underdog and worldwide conflicts, and that there is as a result, many in the African American community naturally are sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, and, by the way, many Jews support the establishment of a Palestinian State. But in terms of the current conflict Bishop Elmer was just trying to provide context to positions of some of his colleagues. And so I'm just wondering when we have within our community Jews of Color from all kinds of different backgrounds on understanding that people who have experienced prejudice bias might have a predilection towards siding with the underdog siding with the oppressed.
Edward Bernstein: I'm curious to what extent you've experienced tensions within your community, you know. I mean, the Jewish community everywhere is people are torn in between, particularly people like me, who want a just solution to the Palestinian Israeli conflict, but feel just bereft about the attack of October seventh but also feel bereft about the destruction in Gaza that's taken place as a result. I mean, it's possible to have multiple feelings at the same time. So I'm curious to what extent are these complex feelings. Being felt by people you you're serving, and how are you helping them navigate that.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: I think I am. I'm helping navigate that I'm available. The day after, when I would get, you know. Pretty scathing mail. I would tell them, my friend, like we were friends. We are friends. Let's find the time to talk and I remembered seeing, like everybody at that, particularly like around October, November. Those early days. I'll send a text now and then a voice, a voice message now and then, and when it's good for them. They will answer right? I'm findable. I've always been findable and I've always made time to talk to listen so that I think I'm I'm continuing.
October 7 is so dark and so bleak, and the start of a war that we didn't ask for a start of unspeakable horrors that no one wishes on anybody. But I also remember the beginning of, I remember, the period of George Floyd during that time, that was also of unspeakable horror for a lot of people in this country and there was a part of me that just had this thought that there were always that there will be unspeakable horrors, that will happen in our life if we are going to ditch everything that we have worked for and turn our backs on each other like just like that just because everything does not fit into a picture that we have in our heads. Then we've lost everything.
So I pray, you know, and I've pleaded with people. Let's not forget any good that we've done with each other. That's not because then then we lose, then then we have lost so much. So I I pray that a certain point there will be there will be a ceasefire, and yes, that ours And our hostages who are left there would be, you know, would come back, would be returned to us. But I've pleaded for humanity, and that hasn't been basic human decency that hasn't been very popular now.
. So and I'm actually reflecting on a year ago, having received this Rabbinical human rights award from Tru’ah and what I did in that year after, and I believe that I was another person I would I would be out on the streets. But I found that a lot more of our community actually needed presence of listening and compassionate and affirmative listening more than another person out there protesting out on the streets.
Edward Bernstein: And that's what we as chaplains bring to the table. Rabbi Rivera, as we near our conclusion. I note that the next major holiday on the Jewish calendar is Shavuot. Shavuot highlights the biblical character of Ruth as a great Jew by choice and it also reminds us that in essence we are all Jews by choice, standing at Sinai. How are these images resonating for you this year? And what message do you wish to leave us with as we head into Shavuot during these challenging times.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: I appreciate the spiritual technology that we have in our hands the counting of the Omer, the invitation to focus on certain attributes each week each day that internal work combined with what I would call the work of our hands, really as chaplains, to go out there and be, and be, and be present, and listen, and offer a safe space for people think. This a good time to do this, to do the internal work the internal work of counting the Omer, of even contemplating. How might I emulate these divine qualities? Not as just as text. But how might I manifest it? How might I do that? And I believe more and more the wedding for me of my practice that I learned as a meditation practitioner and my life now as a Rabbi is. Yes, you study. Yes, you pray, but yes, you do. But you find a way to go out there, do be present. Put yourself out there. If there's a choice between a phone call and or a text or an email and being present, be present.
Edward Bernstein: Reminds me that there was the book. Eat, Pray, Love, and we can have the sequel. Study, pray, do. Beautiful messages for the season. Rabbi Mira Rivera. Thank you so much for coming on NeshamaCast. May you be blessed with courage and strength to continue your sacred work.
Rabbi Mira Rivera she/siya/ella: And it's such a pleasure and so humbling to to be with a fellow traveler, to be with a colleague and yesha koach on the Neshama podcast.
Edward Bernstein: Thank you. NeshamaCast is a production of Neshama, the National Association of Jewish Chaplains. Thank you to our guest, Rabbi Mira Rivera.
Check out of show notes for more information on her and Jews of Color.
Thank you to Rabbi Katja Vehlow, for participating in today’s interview and for her production assistance. Additional thanks to Allison Atterbury, NAJC acting executive director, and Rabbi Drew Kaplan and the NAJC Social Media Committee.
Transcripts for this episode and other episodes off NeshamaCast are available at neshamcast.simplecast.com.
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