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January 2026
Shabbatones at AC
We are delighted to welcome the Shabbatones to AC for Shabbat! The Shabbatones will perform in Hirsch Hall during Kiddush, and will also add their voices to Sanctuary services and children’s tefillah. For more than 20 years, the Shabbatones, the University of Pennsylvania’s premier Jewish a cappella group, have brought joyful, high-energy Jewish music to communities across the country. Founded in 2001, they blend contemporary American pop, Israeli hits, and beloved Jewish choral pieces into dynamic, engaging performances for audiences of…
Find out more »Farewell Kiddush Celebrating Tony Vicioso
Join us to honor and say farewell to our longtime Maintenance Supervisor, Tony Vicioso. Tony has been part of the AC community for more than thirty years (!), doing crucial work -- often behind-the-scenes -- that has kept our many programs and services running smoothly. Let us take some time to thank him for his years of dedicated service and say a heartfelt goodbye before he retires later in the month. Please alo consider making a donation to the Kiddush…
Find out more »Wednesday Night Talmud with Rabbi Jeremy Kalmanofsky
This year, our long-running study group will study tractate Moed Katan, focusing on traditions regarding death and mourning. (Don't be dissuaded by the heavy topic. It's very rich!) This class is best in person -- so please come! Also available via Zoom (Meeting ID: 865 6254 5410| Passcode: chesed)
Find out more »Lunch and Learn: “There’s a Midrash About That!” with Rabbi Yael Hammerman
Working remotely? Retired? Stay-at-home parent? Taking a day off? Please join Rabbi Yael Hammerman for a monthly lunch-and-learn gathering where we will read midrashim from across the centuries. Midrashim help us fill in the blanks in the Torah, they add color to our black and white laws, and they help us develop our own voice and approach to Jewish text. Come - it will be fun! (No Hebrew background necessary). Learn more and RSVP Bring your lunch, according to the AC…
Find out more »Yesodot: Jewish Foundations with Rabbis Jeremy Kalmanofsky and Yael Hammerman
Jewish life often seems to demand a lot of background knowledge. Where do you learn it all, especially as an adult? Please join Rabbi Hammerman and Rabbi Kalmanofsky to learn anew or go back and review some core Jewish practices and concepts. Learn more and register Join us beforehand to Learn to Read the Torah with Hazzan Natasha Hirschhorn.
Find out more »Shabbat Dinner & Discussion: Shared Streets, Shared Words: Jews, Blacks, and the Ghetto
The word ghetto began with Jewish history, yet by the late 20th century it was more commonly associated with Black urban life in America. That shift echoed a familiar urban pattern: neighborhoods once densely Jewish became overwhelmingly Black, and the term ghetto moved with them. What happens when a word so marked by one group’s past is taken up by another? How do shared words shape solidarity—or strain it? And what anxieties surface when communities feel their histories are being eclipsed, appropriated, or misunderstood?…
Find out more »Rabbi Jules Harlow Parshat HaShavuah Class
Join us for our weekly Parashat HaShavua class before the start of Shabbat morning services in the Chapel. Come at 8:45am for hot coffee and a chance to schmooze before the 9am class. This weekly class is dedicated to Rabbi Jules Harlow, a great teacher of Torah and Jewish liturgy. Click here for the Source Sheet (updated Friday afternoons). Also available by Zoom.
Find out more »Learner’s Minyan
The more comfortable you feel in synagogue, the more comforted you can feel in synagogue. Our rabbis and JTS interns -- Rabbi Hammerman, Rabbi Kalmanofsky, Toby Banks and Abigail Goldberg-Zelizer -- will rotate as leaders. You will become more familiar with the literary, spiritual, and musical highlights of the Saturday morning service. After the 45-minute sessions, we will rejoin the wider community in the Sanctuary. 9 Shabbat morning sessions, January 10 - March 7. RSVP here, walk-ins welcome!
Find out more »Potluck Kiddush Conversation with Scholar-In-Residence Daniel Schwartz
Join us for a Kiddush and talk from Scholar-In-Residence Professor Daniel Schwartz: World of Their Children (and Grandchildren, Great Grandchildren): The Making of the Jewish Upper West Side When Irving Howe published World of Our Fathers in 1976, he offered both an elegy for the immigrant Yiddishkeit of the Lower East Side and a critique of what followed: the “world of their children,” whose Jewishness seemed thinner, flatter, and more conventional by comparison. Yet the Upper West Side unsettled that judgment and…
Find out more »Of A Certain Age: January Lunch & Discussion
Join us for our next Of A Certain Age lunch! Fellow Ansche Chesed member and expert Ron Meyers will teach us about wills and trusts. There will be lunch, discussion, and schmoozing. Please RSVP here to help our planning. Walk-ins also welcome.
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