Tzedakah and acts of kindness are the equivalent of all the mitzvot of the Torah” – Jerusalem Talmud, Pe’ah1:1. Over the next year STOM, Shomrei Teens of Montclair, will have the opportunity to create their own organization from start to finish. We will name our organization, write a mission statement, choose where our money will go and decide just how we are going to raise that money or how we will become change makers.

Before we dive into the planning of our own organization we are taking a step back to understand some of the key components that go into this work. We will start by examining Tzedakah (charity,) Midot (values) and Arevut (communal responsibility) together. Our first topic area was Tzedakah, giving charity and the idea of philanthropy. We discussed Warren Buffett, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway as a philanthropist and his decision to give most of his wealth to charity. Would we be able to do that if we had that kind of money? Would our money have a greater impact locally, nationally or globally? Would we give our money to Jewish causes? These are a few of the questions we grappled with and had meaningful discussion about. Of course we ended our time together with some fun and played a lively game of Apples to Apples.

Equality, Respect, Tolerance and Justice are just a few of the Jewish values we discussed this week at STOM. Our focus shifted on Wednesday night this week as we started to discuss midot or values. We asked ourselves why we use the term Jewish values rather than just values, is there really a difference? We looked back at some excerpts from speeches written by George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, John F Kennedy and Barack Obama. What values did their speeches exude that were similar to values we share? When comparing their speeches many of the values they tried to convey were similar to the values we would want to convey if each of us became president. We took a look back in history and used a Jewish lense to discuss how we would want be remembered if we because the president one day.

In the next few weeks we will start to talk about the fundamentals of an organization and working together. One of the key areas we will work on is consensus building. How will we make such big decisions and all agree? To jump start the idea of working together and consensus building we ended our session by making a human knot.We all joined hands and tangled our arms. Without letting go of each others hands we were able to untwist ourselves and In no time at all the group untangled themselves and wound up holding hands in a circle; I wouldn’t have expected anything else from such a dynamic group. We are off to a great start and as the year continues we will keep you updated on this exciting journey we have embarked on.

STOM kids untying their knot.

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Aylah Winter

Prior to moving to Montclair, Aylah and her family lived in Manhattan where she worked for several Jewish non-profit organizations. Most recently, she worked for American Jewish World Service coordinating their international Alternative Spring Break program for Hillel students around the country. Aylah is passionate about experiential education and its value with young adults. During this time she had the opportunity to travel extensively through central America. Aylah is the leader/instructor for STOM (Shomrei Teens of Montclair).

Latest posts by Aylah Winter (see all)

• JLC Prayer for Our Country - Thu, Jan 21, 2021
• STOM – Untying the Knot - Wed, Nov 8, 2017
• Shomrei Teens to Create Their Own Charity - Thu, Aug 31, 2017