Glencoe's Aitz Hayim Sees COVID-19 as no Barrier to its High Holiday Services

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Glencoe's Aitz Hayim has relied on Zoom to maintain its community's connection to Judaism. For the High Holidays this year (September 19 and 20 for Rosh Hashanah and September 27 and 28 for Yom Kippur) rather than pretend that our extraordinary world will not impact these services, Aitz Hayim is creating a different and appropriate Zoom experience this year.

"We will have a number of themed interactive experiences of manageable length drawing on traditional liturgy, creative music and dynamic conversation to engage us in the themes of the holidays. While the Zoom services will capture the traditional aspects of the High Holidays, including Torah readings, innovations will allow technologies to give a new dimension to the services. In addition to the traditional service, there will be three breakout sessions so topics can be explored in depth," according to Marc Slutsky, Aitz Hayim president.

Each of these experiences will be led by Rabbi Elan Babchuck with Cantor David Landau, and the music of multiple Grammy-award winner Howard Levy, Kalyan Patlak and Larry Grey. From the fullness of our liturgy, they are choosing selections that illustrate these important and challenging concerns.

To register and learn more about participating in the Aitz Hayim Center for Jewish Living's High Holiday services, visit www.aitzhayim.org.