iSpirituality: A Personal Story of Boundaries and Boundary-Crossers
at Simon Family JCC
5000 Corporate Woods Drive
Virginia Beach, VA
What are the boundaries of contemporary Jewish experience? In the last fifteen years, Jay Michaelson has taught Kabbalah at Yale and Burning Man; sat five months in silent Buddhist meditation retreat; written a doctoral dissertation on a great Jewish heretic; beat out Christopher Hitchens for a journalism award, for a notorious article called How I’m Losing My Love for Israel; come out as gay and founded two LGBT Jewish organizations; and has sampled the spiritual paths of Sufism, Tibetan Buddhism, earth-based spirituality, Peruvian shamanism, mystical Christianity, neo-Hasidism, paleo-Hasidism, and even plain old Judaism. Speaking from his own experience as well as his perch as a contributing editor to the Jewish Daily Forward, Jay will provoke questions and conversation on the construction of identity, the boundaries of Jewishness, and the evolution of the contemplative path.
As part of the Global Day of Jewish Learning, Jay’s talk will be followed by reflections from several Hampton Roads rabbis and an interactive discussion where you can share your own stories as well.
