By the time Rabbi Rebecca Reice had completed her first month on the job as Congregation Beth Torah’s rabbi educator, she had already experienced a full smorgasbord of a rabbi’s life.
“I did my first funeral on a Monday (July 16). I did my first Bar Mitzvah five days later,” she said. Then two days after that, on Monday, she gave a blessing at a baby naming. That was all during an eight-day period.
Beth Torah will officially welcome Rabbi Reice to the congregation on erev Shabbat, Friday, Aug. 24. Nosh begins at 6 p.m. with the service starting at 6:30 p.m. An Oneg will follow worship. Rabbi John Friedman of Judea Reform Congregation of Durham, N.C., will speak at the worship.
As the rabbi educator, a large chunk of Rabbi Reice’s responsibilities are for the congregation’s education programs, which begin with Pre-K students and extend all the way into senior adults. The religious school, with an enrollment of approximately 225 students in kindergarten through confirmation, is one of the largest in the city. That in itself is a big job.
But that’s not all. She also supervises socially enriching and social justice programming and will share the bimah with Rabbi Mark Levin. The senior rabbi said Rabbi Reice is already doing very well in her new position.
“She’s very bright and has a lot of experience, much more than you would expect from somebody just out of school,” he said.
“It’s a steep learning curve to a new job, but she’s already been successful in pulpit activities, moving the school forward and social justice activities. Everything is moving forward very well. We’re actually delighted.”
Rabbi Friedman has known Rabbi Reice her entire life and Rabbi Levin for more than 30 years. He thinks they will work well together.
“Both Rabbi Levin and Rabbi Reice are deeply authentic. Neither one of them is in this for ulterior motives or needing to be the center of attention or some of the things that draw people to the clergy in general. Both of them deeply love Judaism and Torah and social justice and are great exemplars of a living Judaism that so many Jews in America search for and aspire to and I think they will make a fabulous team. And Mark will be a great mentor for Rebecca, too,” Rabbi Friedman said.
Adjusting to new duties
When Rabbi Reice first learned about the job opening at Beth Torah, she was intimidated by the job description.
“It is a big job and I still do feel overwhelmed sometimes. Rabbi Friedman nudged me to take a second look here. I certainly wouldn’t be here without him. I think that’s really significant to him presenting me here,” she said.
Rabbi Reice said her first month on the job was incredible. She credits that to the support she has received “from every single person on this staff.”
Since she’s been here she’s already had meetings with Weiner Religious School teachers, looked over lesson plans and the school’s curriculum, edited parent handbooks and spent time “really getting to know the school.”
“I’ve also been meeting with parents about their children, meeting with potential new families about the school and meeting with children about themselves. I’ve been meeting with confirmands about this coming year. It’s exciting because it’s been an opportunity to get to know each person,” she said.
Sharing pulpit duties is a role that is very important to Rabbi Reice.
“I love Torah and I love being on the bimah. I have a passion for these things as well and this position allows me to exercise all kinds of passions of mine,” she said.
Young, but experienced
Rabbi Reice may be a novice at Beth Torah, but she brings with her plenty of experience. Before entering rabbinical school, she completed 400 hours of pastoral counseling in an interfaith hospital setting in Austin, Texas. She taught herself how to play guitar in order to help lead services for Texas Hillel while she was an undergraduate. As a rabbinic intern at several congregations, she led worship, gave sermons, led Torah study and even coached confirmation students needing to write their confirmation speeches.
Reice was born and raised in Chapel Hill, N.C. She attended the University of Texas at Austin, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree with special honors in Plan II (honors liberal arts) and psychology. After completing her undergraduate studies, she worked for the Hillel of Silicon Valley as a Hillel Steinhardt Jewish Campus Service Corps Fellow.
She began her rabbinical studies with HUC-JIR in Jerusalem in 2006. In addition to her ordination in 2012, she earned Master of Arts degrees in Hebrew letters (2009) and Jewish education (2010), both from the HUC-JIR Los Angeles campus.
The first time she led High Holy Day services was her junior year in college.
“I went to a program sponsored by the Reform movement called Shuva v’Shira (return and song). It was a preparation program for college students who were going to lead Reform High Holiday services. Several friends I made there are also now rabbis in the Reform movement,” she said.
While interning at a congregation in San Diego, she experienced what it’s like to work somewhere that holds double services at the High Holidays similar to Beth Torah.
“It took a lot of energy,” she said.
She especially remembers what it was like to lead Kol Nidre twice.
“I had real kavanah, real intention for the first part in one service from the Shema and its blessings to the Amidah and then I was really focusing on the congregation and not on my own prayer. Then the next service I really felt I had kavanaugh during the Amidah. It’s like I was able to finish my own worship. But here I won’t be leading two in a row the same way. I’ll be leading some youth worship or family worship in between services in the main sanctuary,” she said.
Rabbi Reice’s biggest challenge so far has been trying to understand all the parts of the Beth Torah community, her role in it and how all the parts fit together.
“I’ve been trying to compare it as not hitting the ground running but trying to get in a car that is already moving,” she explained.
She is enjoying the people she’s met so far. That doesn’t surprise her because she was already impressed by the welcoming attitude of the members when she visited the congregation last winter.
“This is an outstanding community,” she said. “I have been truly amazed by the journeys that people have been sharing with me and everybody has been really kind to me and my husband Asher.”
Rabbi Reice and her husband Asher Lazarus celebrated their second wedding anniversary in July. He is an engineer with IBM.