Spirituality for Girls

Grown-up women in many communities have revitalized Rosh Hodesh (the traditional Jewish women’s half-holiday marking the new moon) as a means of exploring Jewish female identity. Soon girls may have a chance to explore this as well, a welcome antidote to the “deficit model” of programs for teen girls that focus more on what’s wrong with them—eating disorders and low self-esteem—than what’s right. The Adolescent Rosh Hodesh Group Project, a new idea from Kolot—The Center for Jewish Women’s and Gender Studies of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, intends to develop a guide for Rosh Hodesh groups for teenage girls, supervised by Kolot director Lori Lefkovitz. Its broad purpose: “to give girls access to the wealth of materials created by the Jewish feminist revolution.”