How to manage the process with grace, joy and good sense. A practical guide that gives parents and teens the "how-to" information they need to navigate the bar/bat mitzvah process and grow as a family through this experience. For the first time in one book, everyone directly involved offers practical insights into how the process can be made easier and more enjoyable for all. Rabbis, cantors and Jewish educators from the Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist movements, parents, and even teens speak from their own experience. • What's it all about? • Preparation for Parent and Child • Tutoring, stress, expectations, enjoyment, planning for children with special needs • Negotiating the ceremony and celebration • Designing a creative service, heightening the spiritual exercise, special issues related to divorced and interfaith families, planning a party that neither breaks the bank nor detracts from the inherent spirituality of the event.

A 64-page workbook to help rabbis cantors education directors and family programmers prepare b'nai mitzvah students and their families for that momentous life-cycle event--the bar or bat mitzvah.

How to manage the process with grace, joy and good sense. A practical guide that gives parents and teens the "how-to" information they need to navigate the bar/bat mitzvah process and grow as a family through this experience. For the first time in one book, everyone directly involved offers practical insights into how the process can be made easier and more enjoyable for all. Rabbis, cantors and Jewish educators from the Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist movements, parents, and even teens speak from their own experience. - What's it all about? - Preparation for Parent and Child - Tutoring, stress, expectations, enjoyment, planning for children with special needs - Negotiating the ceremony and celebration - Designing a creative service, heightening the spiritual exercise, special issues related to divorced and interfaith families, planning a party that neither breaks the bank nor detracts from the inherent spirituality of the event.

You're in the process of planning your child's bar or bat mitzvah and unanticipated issues keep threatening the joy of this "joyous occasion." Maybe you're divorced and you and your ex are fighting over how much this is all going to cost, never mind how you're going to handle the public awkwardness. Or maybe your spouse isn't Jewish and the whole question of religious meaning is coming up all over again. Or maybe you're worrying about your relatives' disapproval. They're from the city, and your plans for an informal party in the backyard will never meet their expectations. You are in the thick of a complex and pressured moment in your life, sandwiched between the needs of your emerging teenager and your aging parents, dealing with your own issues about being old enough to be the parent of a Bar/Bat Mitzvah (you were always the kid at these affairs, weren't you?), while trying to orchestrate your child's formal coming-of-age in the Jewish community. What would be crazy is if you weren't feeling stressed... For well over a decade, family therapist Judith Davis, Ed.D., has been studying the meaning of the bar/bat mitzvah in the lives of contemporary American Jewish families. In this wise and witty book, the first to focus on the psychological and development issues of the bar/bat mitzvah year, Dr. Davis shows you exactly what you can do to create magic and meaning for the whole family.

Like Judaism itself, the ritual of the Bar and Bat Mitzvah has developed over time. As with all rituals, participants need to invest it with meaning if it is to move beyond mere performance. In a time when we seek to strengthen Jewish continuity and identity, the bar and bat mitzvah provide opportunities to create meaning in our children's lives. It is the moment when the Jewish community grows by one. A Spiritual Journey is at once a guide to the practical issues of becoming a bar or bat mitzvah and an exploration of the deeper emotional and spiritual elements, inviting young adults and their families to appreciate the ritual's inherent richness and beauty. B'nai mitzvah and their parents will benefit from this thoughtful examination of the ceremonies that lie at the heart of Jewish identity. A Spiritual Journey ensures that the ceremony sets Jewish young adults on a lifelong path toward wisdom, faith, justice, and peace.

A haunting and powerful collection of stories from one of America's finest writers.

Study program specially geared to the group of adults becoming adult Bar/Bat mitzvot.