Bar/Bat Mitzvah Program

Becoming Bar/Bat Mitzvah at Kehilla Community Synagogue

In Kehilla's Bar/Bat Mitzvah Program, the Bar/Bat Mitzvah year is an immersion in Jewish learning and development. In its broadest terms, Kehilla’s Bar/Bat Mitzvah Program is designed to help its students come to their own understanding of what God, Judaism, and the Bar/Bat Mitzvah can mean to them personally through an encounter with basic texts, values, and ideas of Jewish teaching. Through this program, the students clarify their identity as Jews, and their connections to this rich heritage.

Kehilla’s approach understands Bar/Bat Mitzvah as a process of growth, reflection, and meaningful exploration. It helps young Jews become more aware of their transition to Jewish adulthood and to envision the kind of adults they would like to become. Students become sons or daughters of the commandments in a way that has genuine meaning for them and for the community. As a first step toward these goals the Bar/Bat Mitzvah program supports and encourages students as they begin to become more self-reliant. Throughout the year students explore what it means to be a Jew in terms of responsibilities: to themselves, to God, to the Jewish people, to family, to the community and to society as a whole. Students experiment with and make commitments to the mitzvot, the righteous and holy commandments of our tradition.

Kehilla’s Bar/Bat Mitzvah Program provides a framework for the intensive study of Torah, Hebrew, and liturgy. It also provides the opportunity for experimentation with, and practice of, moral and religious mitzvot, and the exploration of the many forms of Jewish identity, Jewish spirituality, and prayer. All of these combine to form the foundation of this rite of passage. The months that the student spends in concentrated study culminate in a Shabbat morning service in which the child reads from the Torah, presents a derashah (teaching) to the community and participates in leading the congregation in prayer. The ceremony celebrates a Jewish young person’s becoming a contributing member of their family, spiritual community, and the Jewish people.

Kehilla Community Synagogue is part of the Jewish Renewal movement. This expanding international movement, begun in the 1960’s by Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, Rabbi Sholomo Carlebach, Rabbi Burt Jacobson and many others, seeks to enliven Jewish spirituality for Jews living in a modern, mostly secular world. At the heart of Jewish Renewal is an understanding that tradition is a place from which to grow and that Judaism is strengthened when it is informed by our contemporary experiences as Jews. It is both poignant and reassuring to see young people, on the threshold of their lives as Jewish adults, assume the responsibilities and joys of being Jews.

Supported by peers, teachers, parents, family members and the larger spiritual community, the young person becoming Bar/Bat Mitzvah will be empowered to contribute to shaping the future of the Jewish people. We welcome you on this journey.

Membership in Kehilla Community Synagogue and two years’ attendance in Kehilla School, level 5th & 6th grades, is a prerequisite to enrollment in the Bar/Bat Mitzvah program.

Bar/Bat Mitzvah: Kehilla’s Vision

Kehilla’s Bar/Bat Mitzvah Program is designed to help its students come to their own understanding of what God, Judaism, being Jewish and the Bar/Bat Mitzvah can mean to them personally. It provides a framework for a process of growth, reflection, meaningful exploration and experimentation.

The months the student spends in concentrated study culminate in a Shabbat morning service in which the young person reads from the Torah, presents a drasha (teaching) to the community and helps lead the community in prayer.

The Bar/Bat Mitzvah Program includes:

Classes of 1-3 students meet for 26 sessions. This format supports individualized learning as well as the development of personal relationships between students and teachers. .
Seven hours of one-on-one study with the teacher
Family Workshops
Family Chavurote
Group Social Events
Student and Family Involvement in Designing the Shabbat Service

All Bar/Bat Mitzvah ceremonies are open to the public. You are welcome to attend.

You can find the dates on the Kehilla Calendar.

For further information or questions, email Sandra Razieli, Bar/Bat Mitzvah Program Director, at bbm@kehillasynagogue.org or call (510)-547-2424 x105.