Jewish Life
At Avodah, we see justice as a deep-rooted and powerful part of Jewish life, and Jewish life as a valuable source of sustainability, community, wisdom, and meaning in our justice work.
Throughout your Jewish Service Corps experience, you’ll develop a deep relationship between your justice and Jewishness, and explore all of the powerful connections between the two.
Do I have to be Jewish to be a Corps Member?
While being Jewish is not required to be a Service Corps member, it’s important to know that a large part of the experience, particularly in the programming and communal living components, is based on the interplay between Judaism and social justice, and creating a pluralistic, values-led Jewish community. We do ask that you have the ability and interest to live and learn in an environment that is structured around a Jewish lifestyle, regardless of individual faith.
I am Jewish, but am I “Jewish enough” for the Service Corps?
Definitely! Our pluralistic community is made up of people of all different backgrounds and identities—that’s what makes it so powerful.
Our Corps Members are Secular, “Just Jewish,” Reform, Conservative, Reconstructionist, Modern Orthodox, and everything in between. We also have candidates every year who are still in the middle of the conversion process or are strongly considering it.
We strongly encourage Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews, Jews of Color, queer, trans, and gender non-conforming Jews, Jews who come from poor or working-class backgrounds, Jews who come from interfaith families, and Jews from other underrepresented groups to apply as well!
How diverse is the Jewish Service Corps?
We are committed to building Service Corps cohorts that are inclusive of the full diversity of the Jewish community, including Jews of Color, Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews, queer, trans, and non-binary Jews, Jews from poor or working-class backgrounds, and more. This work is ongoing, and we’re continuing to explore new programmatic supports and recruitment tactics that will bring in and support Jews from diverse backgrounds. In recent years, we’ve built initiatives like our Jews of Color community building offerings and our Economic Access Fund.
As a pluralistic program, we also bring in Jews from diverse denominational backgrounds and observance levels and are committing to building a community that can be reflective of and inclusive to the many ways of living and thinking Jewishly.
Year to year, our exact demographics in our cohorts change. We always have high numbers of participants who identify as part of the LGTBQ+ community, and participants from “Just Jewish” or more secular backgrounds. If you’d like to learn about other specific demographics, or about the experience of Corps Members with marginalized identities in the program, please reach out to our Recruitment Director, Emily, at apply@avodah.net. We’re always happy to connect you to an alum or Corps Member who shares an identity with you, or to get you the best and most transparent information about what your experience may be like!
Will I be housed within walking distance of a synagogue?
We try to put at least one house in each city within walking distance (1.5 miles) of a synagogue. Please be sure to discuss questions or concerns about access to a synagogue during your interview so we can make sure you end up in a bayit (communal home) that meets your religious needs.
Chicago: There are a variety of synagogues within a 15-minute to 30-minute walk of the bayit.
DC: There are a variety of synagogues that are a 20-minute to 50-minute walk from the bayit. By bus, you can reach all major synagogues in the area within 30 minutes.
New Orleans: Within walking distance of the bayit, there are two Reform synagogues, and by Tulane, there is an Orthodox synagogue. The nearest synagogue is 7 minutes, and accessible by walk or street car. Tulane Hillel is also very welcoming. Conservative synagogues are harder to get to by public transit but are a 15-minute drive from the bayit. The JCC is a 20-minute walk, and accessible by street car.
New York City: The bayit is within a 20-minute walk to a variety of synagogues.
What is Shabbat like in the program?
Shabbat is a huge site where our program’s pluralism plays out. You and your fellow Corps Members will create a pluralistic “Community Shabbat” at least once a month. Some Shabbats will likely have practices that are familiar to you, and others will likely introduce practices that may be new or out of your comfort zone. In many houses, Corps Members choose to celebrate together more frequently.
Programs like “Shabbat as a Radical Practice” also help Corps Members think deeply, creatively, and politically about the connections between Shabbat, activism, and their own observance as both individuals and a community.
Outside of Community Shabbats, Corps Members are free to observe Shabbat on their own and explore different celebrations or practices. Many Corps Members enter the program without a regular Shabbat practice, while others may have a regular practice they are excited to share or keep shomer Shabbat (meaning they may observe restrictions like not using their phone). Your service year is a great opportunity to experiment with different practices and rituals in community!
Will I be able to keep kosher? Or, what if I don’t keep kosher?
All kitchens in our houses are kosher to Avodah’s organizational standard at the time of move-in, as long as the survey responses from Incoming Corps Members indicate this standard meets their practices.
During orientation, and as the year progresses, each household negotiates the standards of kashrut (Jewish dietary law) that the members of the community wish to maintain based on the practices of the Corps Members in your home.
If your housemates decide to maintain a kosher kitchen, you will be required to maintain kosher practices while cooking in the bayit (communal home). However, you are not obligated to keep kosher yourself if you do not already.
What is Avodah's Kashrut practice?
Avodah is committed to providing a kosher kitchen to incoming Corps Members when they arrive in their new home. We recognize that there are many ways to practice kashrut (the Jewish laws and customs over food consumption and preparation), and that one’s kashrut practices may be informed by one’s own study, denominational affiliation, ethnic Jewish identification (Ashkenazi, Sephardi, etc.), and more.
Our practice is to kasher (make kosher) the kitchen each off-season to our organizational standard, as long as the survey responses from the incoming Corps Members indicate that this standard meets their practices.
We have determined our standards through consultation with our Ruach Avodah advisors and aimed to develop standards that would align with a rigorous practice of kashrut, grounded in well-supported, non-outlier, opinions in Jewish law. As a pluralistic and diverse Jewish organization, Avodah embraces different legal opinions and practices, not privileging one or the other as custom.
Incoming Corps Members will have a chance to review the full document and alert us to any changes that need to happen before orientation. All food that Avodah provides to Corps Members will meet the kashrut and other dietary needs of the cohort. Then, during orientation, Corps Members will determine with their housemates their household’s kashrut practice moving forward.
Are any of the houses within an eruv?
An eruv is a symbolic, halakhic enclosure that allows for certain activities traditionally prohibited on Shabbat.
Chicago: The bayit (communal home) is not within any of Chicago’s eruvim (the plural form of eruv).
DC: The bayit (communal home)is located within the DC eruv.
New Orleans: The bayit (communal home)is located within the New Orleans eruv. You can view the boundaries of the eruv here.
New York City: The new Brooklyn Eruv encompasses the majority of Brooklyn, including our New York City bayit (communal home). You can view the boundaries of the eruv here.