A childhood career dream is coming true for Taylor Poslosky. She’ll receive her rabbinical ordination Saturday at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati and then take her new position as assistant rabbi at Congregation Shalom in Milwaukee.
“I always loved learning, and when I was 7 or 8, I asked my dad if I could tag along to Torah study with him. I always loved being Jewish and learning about new things,” she said.
Nurturing her love of Jewish education at Congregation Beth Torah were former b’nai mitzvah coordinator David Finn and former religious school and youth groups director Marcia Rittmaster.
At her bat mitzvah lessons, “We had to come up with a question before our next session. It could be about the service, Torah portion or anything in Judaism. That got me asking lots of questions, and I never stopped,” Poslosky said.
In her four years of rabbinical studies, she discovered a love of pastoral care, and even considered becoming a chaplain after doing training rotations at two hospitals and an assisted living facility.
The highlight was “just getting to spend time with patients and residents and hear their stories and learn more about their hopes and dreams and fears and just all that was going on in their lives and sit with them and hopefully give them a moment to process through some of those things,” she said.
This past year has been a little different.
“It has been a unique challenge this year with COVID. I went back and forth — I really wanted to, but was pretty scared about going back into hospital. We can’t hold a patient’s hand, can’t give them a hug if they’re crying. At a certain point, the hospital deemed it not safe for us to be there at, and it was all over the phone — it was heartbreaking,” she said.
For a while she wasn’t sure whether to pursue chaplaincy work or work as a Hillel rabbi, as she did during a rotation at Ohio State University, or to go with her original goal of being a pulpit rabbi.
“The thing that solidified it for me, that I want to work at a congregation, was I do want to do that pastoral care, and I want to be able do it over the course of a lifetime with people. I want to see them not just in that moment they’re in the hospital or for that four-year period when they’re at college,” she said. “I want to be able to be at their baby naming, see them for their bar or bat mitzvah, then teach them adult ed classes, be with them under the chuppah when they get married.”
Her experience having been a Daniel L. Brenner intern with the Jewish Heritage Foundation, through a Jewish Federation program, will also help in her endeavors as a congregation rabbi.
“It gave me a skillset I don’t know that a lot of rabbis come in with, looking at budgets, looking at grant proposals, how to evaluate them, so I know what organizations are looking for in a grant proposal,” she said.
Although she’d always wanted to be a rabbi, a fatal car accident she was involved in as a teenager gives her choice of profession a deeper purpose.
The accident happened in August 2007, when Poslosky lost control of the minivan she was driving along Kansas Highway 10. She was 16 at the time. After switching lanes, she swerved onto a grassy median, crossed it, and struck Derek Risner’s oncoming Ford Explorer.
The 17-year-old Risner died, and Poslosky was taken to the hospital in critical condition.
“I feel like I’m living for two people. Derek was a really great person. He was a helper. … It sort of strengthened this desire of mine to go into a helping profession. I’m doing it not just for me. I’m doing it for Derek too,” she said.
Her previous colleagues are confident in her ability to succeed as a rabbi. Rabbi Rony Keller, now senior associate rabbi at Congregation B’nai Israel in Boca Raton, worked with Poslosky in Scottsdale, where she was a youth director before starting her rabbinical studies.
“There’s a natural warmth and kindness to her, an innate sense of caring. She was able to zero in on how people were feeling and how they were doing, even if they weren’t outwardly saying it,” Rabbi Keller said. “… When the conversation popped up about the rabbinate, I thought, ‘What better person than Taylor to become a rabbi?’”
He praised her passion for her studies.
“She’s a constant learner. She’s not complacent in her knowledge base. She’s always asking questions and trying to make sure the steps she does take are with the proper preparation,” he said.
Poslosky can’t wait to start her position in Milwaukee this summer.
“I’m excited to get to explore what it’s going to be like. I’ve heard about the Green Bay Packers obsession. I’m still going to be a Chiefs fan — that will never change,” she said.
