Giving back to Israel
Rabbi
chooses volunteerism over tourism
DR. R.
ZEV WELLINS
Dr. R. Zev Wellins, who serves as
rabbi and spiritual leader for the Sun Lakes Jewish
Congregation, visited Israel June 19-July 4 to
participate in the Jewish Agency for Israel's program of
Sherut LeYisrael, "Service to Israel." Following is an
account of his visit.
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Rabbi R. Zev Wellins, right, visits with a resident of
the Tzahalon Geriatric Center, where he volunteered as
part of the Sherut LeYisrael, "Service to Israel"
program last summer.
Photo courtesy of Sun Lakes Jewish Congregation
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The rabbi spent two weeks this summer in Israel. It was not
for the purpose of relaxation and recreation, but rather for
"reaching out" and "reconnecting."I went to Tel Aviv and
Jaffa in order to participate in the Jewish Agency for
Israel's program of Sherut LeYisrael, "Service to Israel."
An appeal had gone out to Jews all over the world for
volunteers to assist the Jewish State at a time of great
need. I was among the very few who heard the call. I was
assigned to the Tzahalon Geriatric Center in downtown Jaffa.
Israel has been suffering greatly from the downturn in
tourism since the beginning of the current Arab intifada.
More than one third of its economy is based on revenue from
foreign tourism, and as a result of the outbreak of violent
conflict, visitors to Israel from the United States and
other nations have been reduced by 93 percent.
Add to this the need to spend millions of shekels on
military deployment, along with calling up Israeli citizens
from reserve to active military duty, and you can understand
that Israel is suffering financially.
The means to replenish the equivalent of millions of dollars
in financial and social capital remains unclear. The
"Service to Israel" program provides part of the solution.
The goal is for these volunteers to fill the void left by
civilian community service and medical workers who had
become soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces, called into
duty in response to the Palestinian insurgency.
In the United States, the plea to spend two weeks or more in
Israel as an unpaid helper went, for the most part,
unanswered.
I was determined to make this commitment, even as many
advised us that, "this is really not a good time to go, what
with everything going on over there," and despite their
warnings that, "you're putting your life in jeopardy ...
you might get blown up."
It seems that some of our fellow Americans had missed the
point of my going in the summer of 2002. It is all too easy
to make commitments and stand up for what you believe when
everything is going fine; but as President Richard M. Nixon
used to say, "When the going gets tough, the tough get
going."
Should we turn away, pretending not to hear the cry? Should
we distance ourselves, making up and rehearsing all of the
practical reasons and comfortable excuses to avoid personal
involvement?
I decided instead to take a different path. I issued a
challenge, which was published in the Tucson community's
Jewish newspapers and Web sites, to my rabbinical
colleagues, the lay leadership, and the Tucson Jewish
community to join me in volunteering.
In addition, many Israeli leaders had appealed for those
Jewish organizations who canceled summer programs in Israel
this year to reconsider their decision.
My thinking on this subject is that people's fears about
going to Israel demonstrated three points: that they had
little faith in the protection of the Almighty; that by
stating it was for the safety of their children they had
passed on their own fear to these very same children; and
that they had handed the terrorists a great victory by
choosing not to go.
During my travels in Israel this summer, I met many
Israelis who asked curiously what I was doing there.
When I told them that I had come to volunteer at the Tzahalon
Geriatric Center in Jaffa, they all generously gave me a
similar response: Kol hakavod lacha, "well done."
I had reconnected myself to our Israeli brothers and
sisters. Even though it was only one of me, I made
a difference by breaking in some measure the "disconnect"
between our two different brands of Jewish culture.
At the Geriatric Center, I was assigned to the fourth
floor, where a group of approximately 40 residents were
cared for by a staff of nurses, aides, social workers and
other helpers. I was welcomed with enthusiasm to serve as
a combination of aide, social worker and helper.
My charges were men and women at least 70 years old who
were confined to wheelchairs. Their levels of consciousness
spanned from those who were conscious most of the time to
those who spent their waking hours in a dimension of sight,
sound and mind that was entirely their own.
Their mother tongue language also varied and included
Hebrew, Russian, Arabic, French, Romanian and Yiddish.
Immediately immersed into their daily routine, I soon
became part of the fourth-floor family. I fed breakfast and
lunch to those who could not feed themselves and helped to
clean up after meals and snacks. I took them downstairs for
excursions in their wheelchairs in the gardens and pathways
of the walled center, which once had been the British
Military Headquarters in pre-state Palestine. I talked with
them, took part in social and religious activities with
them, laughed with them, and sometimes cried with them.
In an extremely short period of time I was able to reach
out to these lonely souls, who under other circumstances
could have been our parents and grandparents.
I was thanked again and again for being there, even if it
was for such a short time. To them, time is irrelevant, but
happy memories endure.
The daily ritual of reaching out to my new friends at the
Geriatric Center took on a religious quality. In many ways
it was like spending six hours a day in prayer and study.
This was indeed for me a spiritual experience of reaching
out from person to person, from generation to generation,
and from soul to soul. They felt good and I felt better; I
knew that I had made the right decision in coming to
Israel.
To learn more about volunteer programs in Israel, visit the
Web pages for the Jewish Agency for Israel (http://www.jafi.org.il/),
Volunteers for Israel (http://www.vfi-usa.org/)
or Sar-El Volunteers for Israel (http://www.sar-el.org/).
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June 27, 2003/Sivan 27 5763, Vol. 55, No. 44
Community caregiver
Chandler chaplain serves hospice, East Valley
LEISAH NAMM
Managing Editor
To better serve its Jewish
patients, Hospice of the Valley now has a rabbi on its
chaplaincy staff.
Rabbi Zev Wellins, who initially moved from Tucson to
Chandler to serve as rabbi of Sun Lakes Jewish
Congregation, withdrew from that post to accept the
position at the hospice.
The hospice provides end-of-life care to patients at its
nine inpatient units in Maricopa County. More than 90
percent or more of its patients are served in their own
homes, according to the hospice's Web site. Since 1977,
Hospice of the Valley has served more than 38,000
patients.
"We have a priest on our staff and we have other people
of other denominations who serve as pastoral
counselors," said Kathy Melamed, the hospice's director
of counseling and support services. "We did not have
anyone who could specifically serve the needs of our
Jewish patients so we are very pleased to be able to add
his expertise and his unique contribution."
Wellins will primarily serve Jewish patients and will
visit patients of other faiths as necessary, Melamed
said. "When we hire pastoral counselors, it's with the
intent that they should serve whoever is one of our
patients, no matter what their faith," she said. But,
"it's a great advantage for families to have a rabbi
when that is the person that they really need and want
to speak with."
Melamed also views Wellins' role as educational. "We
want our staff to know about the Jewish faith and the
belief systems and the practices and how we can, as a
team, serve that patient well."
In addition to his role at the hospice, Wellins will
also assist the Valley's community chaplain, Rabbi
Martin Scharf, by assuming chaplain duties in the East
Valley.
The position of community chaplain falls under the
auspices of the Kivel Jewish Community Chaplaincy
Council, which offers rabbinic support to hospitalized
Jewish patients and the unaffiliated Jewish community
throughout Greater Phoenix.
Initially, Kivel received nearly $12,000 in allocations
from the Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix
specifically for the Kivel rabbi to com- mit time to a
community chaplaincy, said Fred Zeid-man, federation
assistant executive director. Federation board minutes
dating back to 1986 show that a separate chaplaincy was
set aside for close to that amount each year, he said.
In 1997, an allocation of about $13,000 was rolled over
into Kivel's base allocation.
In his role as community chaplain, Scharf is called upon
at all hours to visit nursing homes, hospitals and
hospices, in addition to officiating at lifecycle events
such as weddings and funerals.
"Like with all clergy ... you are available 24/7,"
Scharf said. "Hospitals have called me at two in the
morning and (I) go."
Scharf also provides full-time pastoral and rabbinic
services at Kivel Campus of Care in Phoenix.
"It was difficult for me to go out to the Lutheran
hospital all the way out on Power Road and to find time
(to visit patients there)," Scharf said. "(Wellins')
willingness to go out in the East Valley ... will be a
big help."
Wellins foresees that his biggest challenge will be
"pure numbers."
"The influx of Jews to this East Valley area is
overwhelming," he said.
Wellins noted that when unaffiliated Jews "are sick,
when they are in family crisis or health crisis, they
want to be able to call upon a rabbi, but since they
don't belong (to a congregation), they have no rabbi to
call upon."
That presents a tremendous problem, he said. "The
congregational rabbis have all they can do to serve the
needs of their own congregations."
Rabbi Bonnie Koppell of Temple Beth Sholom in Chandler
said she is "very, very thrilled" about Wellins' new
role.
"We're very delighted to have the support of the
community," she said. "It's been an unmet need for a
long time."
In the past, Koppell performed chaplain duties for
unaffiliated Jews if she was available, "but it can, at
times, get to a point where it really has an impact on
my work with the congregation so it will be great to
have a source for referrals," she said.
Rabbi Mendy Deitsch of Chabad of the East Valley visits
Jewish patients in East Valley hospitals every other
week. "We've been trying to set up a system with our
social action group to visit people in the hospital," he
said. He called the future impact of Wellins' presence
in the East Valley "beneficial."
"He's an extremely compassionate person," Rabbi Lester
Frazin of Sun Lakes' Temple Havurat Emet said of Wellins.
"I know if I were terminally ill, I would want someone
like him around."
Rabbi Andrew Straus of Temple Emanuel of Tempe called
Wellins' new role "a great thing that's happening for
the community. ... I know that Rabbi Scharf is well
overloaded."
Scharf said he does have some volunteers who help him
visit patients, but recent privacy rules "are making it
harder and harder for people who are just volunteers to
go and get lists of people (based on faith)," he said.
Wellins is also the executive director of The Center for
Spiritual Judaism, which he founded in August 2001 in
Tucson. The nonprofit organization
provides rabbinic services, including chaplaincy, adult
education and lifecycle ceremonies and technically
serves the entire state of Arizona. Its headquarters are
now in Chandler, Wellins said.
He is also a member of the National Association of
Jewish Chaplain's Bio-Ethics Committee and the Greater
Phoenix Board of Rabbis.
A few other Valley rabbis also hold chaplain positions,
although theirs are more for a specific organization
rather than for the Jewish community.
Rabbi Robert Kravitz of the American Jewish Committee
volunteers as a chaplain at the Arizona Department of
Public Safety, Highway Patrol, and police departments of
the City of Phoenix and the City of Scottsdale. He works
with law enforcement personnel and their families. His
responsibilities include counseling, support and
responding to crime trauma.
In addition to his role at Chabad of the East Valley,
Deitsch serves as chaplain for the Federal Correctional
Camp and the Federal Correctional Institute in Phoenix,
and he visits each place monthly to provide moral
support to inmates, as well as Jewish holiday and food
items.
Rabbi Ernest Michel, a chaplain for the Maricopa County
Sheriff's Office, visits inmates about 20 hours each
week. "The Jewish com-munity could use at least two more
chaplains in the jail system," he said. Michel, who has
served as a chaplain in Arizona jails since 1982, is
currently looking to train somebody to assist him. Call
602-953-3060.
To contact the Kivel Jewish Community Chaplaincy
Council, call 602-956-3110.
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Hank B. Slotnick, PhD
I call my son to tell him his Grampa is
dying. "Again?" he asks, acknowledging that
we've expected Pa to die twice before. The
first death watch followed his GI bleed 5
months before, and the second came after
what was probably a sub- or epidural bleed
due to a fall last month. The key word here
is "probably," since Pa has an advance
directive that effectively precludes finding
out exactly what his problems are. We're not
going to do anything other than keep him
comfortable no matter what the diagnostic
findings, so there is no practical reason to
do the tests.
This time Pa's much worse than after
either his bleed or his fall. His pupils are
shrunken and fixed, his hands and feet are
very cool to the touch, mottling is
developing on his left foot, and he is
unresponsive to my voice. I watch as he
draws small, shallow, rapid breaths that
slowly build in intensity and then taper off
until they stop altogether. He and I wait
anxiously until he starts the routine again.
The physician who looks after Pa and the
nurses who know him tell me he'll live about
a week more.
It turns out that Rabbi Wellins is here
today. He's the rabbi who conducts a service
one Sunday each month at the facility where
my parents live. Mary Lou and I take Ma to
the service, which we all enjoy, and I talk
to the Rabbi afterward. He is very
comforting, very reassuring.
But most of all, he's informative. He
answers all my questions about Jewish
traditions and rituals associated with death
and dying, and he offers suggestions about
things I haven't thought of. Because he
knows my parents -- they've regularly
attended his Sunday services -- what he says
is comforting in its intimacy. He has spoken
with Pa in Hebrew, and like the rest of us,
he has enjoyed Pa's singing.
Rabbi Wellins also tells me of a
tradition called a Vidui, which is a
confession of one's sins. Ideally, Vidui is
said within 72 hours of a person's death and
while the person is still conscious. If the
person is conscious, he knows both that he
is about to stand before God, and that a
sincere confession of one's sins before
death helps ensure a portion in the world to
come.
We decide to conduct a Vidui for Pa.
The Rabbi and Frieda, a friend from the
facility where Ma and Pa live, meet Mary Lou
and I at the entrance to the Alzheimer's
unit 15 minutes later. "What is his
mamaloschen?" the Rabbi asks.
Mamaloschen is a Yiddish word meaning
"mother tongue," and I tell him it is
Yiddish. "Why is he asking?" I wonder, and I
decide he's probably collecting information
for the comments he'll give at the funeral.
We go to Pa's room and find him very
agitated; he's pulled off his bedclothes and
his diaper, and, when I return after looking
for a caregiver to help us, he's sliding out
of the bed on his back. I reach across the
bed, grasp him under his arms, and pull him
into a less dangerous, more comfortable
position. The caregiver arrives and we
finish straightening Pa up.
Mary Lou goes around to the far side of
the bed so she can hold Pa's left hand, and
I stand across from her holding his right
hand. Rabbi Wellins puts on his tallis
as he stands next to Mary Lou, while Frieda,
who has moved to the foot of the bed, gently
touches Pa's foot. Pa remains agitated with
his eyes open but unseeing, his mouth open
but silent. He is unmoved when I tell him
who is here with him.
"What is his Hebrew name?" Rabbi Wellins
asks me. A Hebrew name has two parts, a
given name and the name of the individual's
father. The two names are separated by the
word "ben" for men or "bat" for women -- the
words indicating the filial relationship
between the two people.
"I don't know his father's given name," I
reply, "but his name is Yitzchak."
I lean over Pa with my mouth next to Pa's
ear. "Pa," I ask, "what is your Hebrew
name?" He doesn't respond, and so I ask
again. Still no response.
Rabbi Wellins asks Pa, b'Yvrit --
in Hebrew -- what his father's name is. Pa's
lips begin to move, but it isn't possible to
hear what he's saying. The Rabbi asks me
what my grandfather's name was in English. I
tell him it was "Harry," and the Rabbi says
that my grandfather's Hebrew name was most
likely Chaim. He now turns to Pa and
asks, b'Yvrit, if his name is
Yitzchak ben Chaim.
"Kane," Pa whispers the Hebrew
word for "yes" and then, loudly enough so
that all can hear, "Yitzchak ben Chaim."
Soon there is enough conversation between
the Rabbi and Pa alternating between Yiddish
and Hebrew that the Rabbi, Mary Lou, Frieda,
and I all know that Pa understands what is
happening. His body is unchanged, his eyes
are still open and unseeing, but he's aware
of who's there and that the confession he's
about to make is in anticipation of the fact
that he'll soon be in the presence of God.
The Rabbi begins the Vidui prayers, first
in Hebrew, then in English. I'm struck by
the repetitiveness of some phrases:
Adonai echad, Adonai echad -- God is
one, God is one. And I recall what Rabbi
Wellins said an hour earlier about that
phrase: God is a oneness that encompasses
both people and things, filling the
universe.
I realize that for the moment, the 5 of
us, connected only by the immediacy and the
gravity of what we are doing, are the
universe. There is no reality beyond the 4
of us surrounding Pa, and time is an
irrelevancy. The Rabbi continues with his
prayers, Mary Lou continues holding Pa's
left hand and I his right. Frieda stands at
the foot of the bed.
There is now a presence in the room, a
sense that we are alone and not alone at the
same time. The oneness Rabbi Wellins
described earlier has enveloped us as he
prays and as we listen to his words.
The Vidui is soon finished, and Rabbi
Wellins and Frieda are ready to leave,
though Mary Lou and I are not. I tear myself
away from Pa long enough to shake the
Rabbi's hand and thank him for what he's
done for my father. Frieda hugs me, weeping
quietly, and she and the Rabbi leave. I turn
back to Pa and notice that he, too, has eyes
brimming with tears. He says nothing --
there is nothing to say -- while Mary Lou
and I wipe away his tears, tell him we love
him, and that we're here with him. He
remains motionless, the agitation we saw
earlier replaced by silent calmness.
I spend the rest of that day and all of
the next with him and my mother. I give him
a shave early Monday morning and talk to him
several times throughout the day even though
his condition is unchanged from Sunday
afternoon. I return home late Monday telling
him I'll be back to see him on Wednesday, my
plan being to spend every other day with him
and Ma until his condition deteriorates
further, and then I'll be with him 24/7.
I receive a call Tuesday afternoon, 2
days after the Vidui, telling me he's passed
on.
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Hank B. Slotnick, PhD, Visiting
Professor, Department of Internal
Medicine, University of
Wisconsin-Madison Medical School,
Madison, Wisconsin
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