Community Corner

Even for those of us who are generally optimistic, it is so easy to focus on all the “wreckage” in our lives (e.g., all the bad decisions we’ve made, all the times we’ve fallen, all the good resolutions that were never kept, all the places where we feel like we have no control). Positive change seems so far away, and we have fully convinced ourselves that there is no point in hoping that we can do any better.

We are all looking forward with great anticipation to the annual Erna Lindenfeld Hachnosas Kallah Tea to be held next Tuesday evening, November 16, at 8:30 p.m. The Tea has been a Queens hallmark event for decades, providing our community with the opportunity to give tz’dakah to a most worthy local cause, while enjoying incredible entertainment and amazing raffle prizes.

The Young Israel of Jamaica Estates has been organizing a monthly Family Mitzvah Morning for more than seven years now. Originally conceived of by Rabbi Emeritus and Rebbetzin Shlomo and Karen Hochberg, and now continued under the leadership of the current rav, Rabbi Dov Lerner and his wife Miriam, families, including kids, parents, and grandparents come together each month for a fun activity or project to support an organization or chesed program in need. The monthly program is coordinated by volunteer Yael Schreiber and YIJE’s Youth Director, Jacob Herskowitz.

The following was compiled based on Rav Aharon Pessin’s hesped delivered at the l’vayah held on Thursday, October 14, at the Schwartz Brothers-Jeffer Memorial Chapels in Forest Hills. K’vurah followed at New Montefiore Cemetery.

On Sunday evening, October 17, the virtual program Lets Get Real with Coach Menachem featured shiur #76 with two professionals in the field of addictions. Coach Menachem introduced the program with the statement that “No matter where anybody is, there is hope.”

Forty-five minutes before Shabbos, and the chaplain of Booth Memorial is working feverishly to repair the refrigerator door. “Please, I implore you to go home to your family. Shabbos is around the corner and you’re not going to make it home for Shabbos.” The chaplain ignores my pleas and continues to work desperately on the door so I could have a working fridge in the bikur cholim apartment. He finally gets the door back and races against time to come home for Shabbos. This Lamed-Vav tzadik was Rabbi David Keehn zt”l. He was niftar on Monday, October 25.