Spotlight on CLAL Archive

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Finding Meaning in The Life and Death of a Shtetl

By Andrew Silow-Carroll, Communications Director

What would the builders of the vibrant Jewish communities that disappeared during the Holocaust have asked of this generation's Jewish leaders? That was the challenge put to guests at "Remembering Luboml: An Evening with CLAL," held recently at the Minneapolis Jewish Community Center. The event, hosted by Judy and Richard Spiegel, Sheila and Steve Leiberman, David Kunin, and Debbie and Gil Mann, was the most recent of what has become an annual gathering of CLAL supporters and alumni in Minnesota. The backdrop of the event was the Luboml Exhibit Project, a traveling museum exhibition initiated in 1994 by CLAL Honorary Associate Chairman Aaron Ziegelman to preserve the history and memory of the Jewish shtetl where he was born.

Rabbi Steve Greenberg, CLAL Senior Teaching Fellow, used the powerful photographs of Luboml to help viewers explore their own Jewish stories and memories. Pointing out the bountiful expressions of Jewish shtetl life--Torah study, soccer teams, cafés, political clubs, literary societies, artisans--Rabbi Greenberg asked if today's leaders are prepared to build communities as fertile as Luboml under conditions infinitely more secure and affluent. "These voices suggest that we wake up on the other side of the Holocaust and the birth of the State of Israel to rise up and create the most vibrant Jewish culture ever," said Rabbi Greenberg.

The Minnesota event is another example of how CLAL is educating and preparing lay and professional Jewish leaders tomorrow's Jewish communities.