Mazel Tov to the Adult B’nai Mitzvah class of 2025!

Pictured from left to right – Front Row: Lisa Haber-Chalom, Audrey Levitin, Joyce Spiegel, Sylvia Cohn; Middle Row: Anita Vogel, Fran Legman, Amanda Gold, Katie Toledano; Back Row: June Zimmerman, Nick Levitin, Kelli Mason

Introduction Before the Torah Reading by Sylvia Cohen

Shabbat Shalom and welcome to this, the very first group Adult B’nai Mitzvah ceremony in Shomrei Emunah’s long 120-year history!

We are a very diverse group –all eleven of us – young, not so young and, as you can see, much older.

We come from very different backgrounds, different life experiences and different levels of Judaic knowledge – but we all have reached this moment together.

Today’s Torah portion, B’midbar, in Numbers, the fourth of the five books of the Torah, finds the Israelites in the desert, during their long journey to the Promised Land, being instructed to take a census, being told where each clan should encamp, who should carry the sacred tabernacle and how to organize to prepare for whatever may lay ahead.

While B’midbar is called Numbers in English, the word in Hebrew means desert and while Numbers refers to the census, the story also focuses on the role of each clan. The individual clans will have to work together to achieve success.  Likewise, we are a collective of eleven B’nai Mitzvot, each with our own story, who have studied together in pursuit of the same goal.  Our stories [were] printed in your Shabbat program booklet [some of which are posted below]. I encourage you to read them.

We, too, needed much instruction.  We thank all who taught us as a group and all who tutored us individually during this past year – all who guided us through our desert of learning.

And now – we have arrived at the moment when each of us will be called to the Torah for an Aliyah, to read directly from the Torah for the very first time, and to accept and shoulder, with greater understanding, all the privileges and responsibilities of being a more complete Jewish adult going forward.

Stories contributed by Fran Legman, Nick Levitin, Kelli Mason, Joyce Spiegel & June Zimmerman

Fran Legman

Becoming a Bat Mitzvah as a Senior has been one of the most meaningful decisions of my life—a choice born from a desire to deepen my spiritual roots, engage my mind, and build lasting connections within my community. For decades, my Jewish identity lived primarily through culture and family tradition, but lacked ritual fluency. Learning to read Hebrew opened a door for me – I can now follow the rhythm of the service, recognize familiar words, and, most thrillingly, join the congregation in song.

Reading Hebrew isn’t simply a linguistic achievement; it’s a bridge to belonging. As I chant the melodies of Shabbat, I feel the gentle power of collective voice surround me. Services have become a pleasure, rather than an obligation—each page of the siddur a new discovery, each melody a thread weaving me more tightly into the fabric of the Shomrei community. I no longer sit on the sidelines. With excitement and nervousness, I can now lead the service from the bimah.

Beyond ritual, this journey has reignited my curiosity about Jewish history and thought. Until now, painting was my sole conduit to meditation and creative calm. Yet there is something liberating about the repetition of ancient words, the rise and fall of chant, and the stillness they eventually bring to my mind. I look forward to reading the history of Jewish life across centuries. Every story enriches my own.

Through this ceremony, I claim both heritage and hope: affirming that it is never too late to learn, to sing, to join hands in prayer—and that spiritual growth knows no age.


Nick Levitin – A Long Postponed Journey

How does one create a relationship with God? What does that even mean?

I didn’t start going to synagogue until I was 39. It was on Rosh Hashanah. I entered B’nai Jeshurn in New York City, sat down, opened the Machzor and saw the words, “Help me O God to Pray”. And there was my answer.

I grew up in a secular Jewish family where Judaism was deeply meaningful, though not religiously practiced. My father had his Bar Mitzvah in Russia. We celebrated the holidays. My father loved the writings of Martin Buber, but we didn’t attend Shabbat services, and I never had a Bar Mitzvah.

Years later, as president of Shomrei, I had the honor of presenting B’nai Mitzvot with gifts from the Congregation acknowledging their accomplishment—a moment that was both celebratory for them and somewhat poignant for me — a painful awareness, one more time, of the absence of a moment like that in my own life.

When Rabbi Julie proposed an adult B’nai Mitzvah class, many of us who had not observed this moment in our youth signed up—eager, if a bit nervous. And here we are.

My gratitude to Rabbi Julie, Morah Cecilia, Morah Sarah, Craig Eichner and Merrill Silver for so generously sharing with us, their time and love of Torah. In addition to Rabbi Julie, I must also thank Rabbis Marshall T. Meyer, Roly Matalon, and David Greenstein. Each, in their own way, shared their love of the Torah in such a way that always called me to higher ground.

And so today, we say the words of Shehecheyanu – with gratitude to the Holy One and to all who have brought us to this moment.

And, my thanks to Carney Mimms who upon his bar mitzvah challenged me to have my own and to whom I promised I would.

Kelli Mason

It has been almost exactly one year since I completed my conversion to Judaism, and writing this on the eve of my bat mitzvah fills me with deep meaning and gratitude.

My journey to Judaism began nearly two decades ago, during a semester abroad in Ghana. At Cape Coast Castle, I stood in the “door of no return,” where countless enslaved Africans were forced onto ships bound for the Americas. I felt the weight of that history—grief, anger, and also overwhelming gratitude. Despite everything, starting from this place of “no return” and surviving centuries of brutality, I had returned.

In that moment, a classmate spontaneously recited the Shehecheyanu blessing in English. Her translation was: “Holy One of Blessings, Your presence fills creation. You have kept us alive, You have sustained us, You have brought us to this moment.” Her words gave language to everything I was feeling: sorrow, survival, awe. That blessing stayed with me. It was my first invitation into Jewish thought, and it planted a seed.

As I learned more about Judaism, I was struck by its insistence on responsibility—particularly the concept of tikkun olam, the call to repair the world, not through hope alone, but through action. Where the faith of my Christian upbringing often pointed to divine rescue or rewards in the afterlife, Judaism asked: what can you do, here and now?

That question stayed with me through law school, my career, and motherhood. Over the years and various life stages, I kept returning to Jewish ideas, community, and values. Eventually, I realized I could no longer stand outside of something that already felt like home.

One year ago, with the support of my family and this community, I formally became Jewish. It was the culmination of a year of intensive study and preparation, but I wanted to be sure that my conversion was the beginning, not the end. I wanted to keep learning, deepening my faith, and claiming this tradition as my own. Joining the adult b’nai mitzvah class gave me the structure, community, and encouragement I needed to step more fully into Jewish life.

Now, as I become a bat mitzvah, I return to that moment of blessing: Baruch atah Adonai, Eloheinu melech ha’olam, shehecheyanu v’kiyimanu v’higiyanu lazman hazeh.

Thank you to my family, Rabbi Julie, my classmates, teachers, friends, and the entire Shomrei community for continuing to walk this path with me.

Joyce Spiegel

I grew up in the Bronx, a few blocks from Yankee stadium. My family lived in the same apartment building as my maternal grandparents. My sister, brother, and I attended Akiba Hebrew Academy. My Zeidy (grandfather) would help us with our Hebrew homework. Although he spoke Ashkenazi and Galitziana Hebrew, he could effortlessly switch to modern, Sephardic Hebrew. We attended his synagogue – a small Orthodox shul above a dry cleaner’s. I have memories of walking to service holding his hand on Erev Shabbat. I was thrilled to sit in front with him, as I was young enough that I wasn’t required to sit behind the mechitza with the women.

Our seders were always at my grandparents, with my Zeidy leading, wearing his white kittel, and my brother sitting next to him. As all of us attended yeshivot, we sang every version of every song as we read the Haggadah. In the summers we went to a Jewish bungalow colony and to Jewish camps.

My family moved to New Jersey where I started public school in 8th grade. My sister and I attended Prozdor – the high school division of the Jewish Theological Seminary. My brother continued in a yeshiva and later attended Ramaz High School in Manhattan. We joined the Jewish Community Center of Paramus, a Conservative synagogue. B’nai B’rith Girls became the center of my social life. I went to Israel with them in 1972.

I moved to Montclair in 2022, and was invited to the High Holy day services at Shomrei. When I met Rabbi Julie, Lily, and the congregation, I had a feeling of homecoming. Previously, I would decline honors, thinking that I would embarrass myself due to lack of familiarity. Here I found that no question was stupid, asking was encouraged and welcomed. I asked Rabbi Julie about the possibility of having an adult B’nai Mitzvah class. When she told me about this class, I was immediately on board. It has been a joyous experience from the beginning.

My Hebrew name is Simchat Yehudit – Simcha after my maternal great grandfather, and Yehudit after my mother’s therapist. I love my Hebrew name. My mother was always outspoken about women’s roles and women’s rights. I wish she were well enough to be here and share in the joy of reaching this milestone. I am so grateful to all who have supported me. I hope they will continue to be beside me as my journey continues.

June Zimmerman

Sometimes you want something and it doesn’t come, and then when you don’t ask, it arrives. I had requested an adult bnai mitzvah class at Shomrei since I joined in 1999, but no class ever emerged. Then Rabbi Julie came on board and proposed this program. At first I asked myself, “Why undertake this now?” It would involve a lot of time and effort, my kids’ Jewish identities were already formed, and I was fully reconciled to not engaging in services and finding other meaning at Shomrei.

Yet, there was something about Rabbi Julie’s enthusiasm and the educational longing of the small group of members who attended our first meeting that spoke to me. “Why not?” I thought. When the world was saying I was old enough to get reduced train fares and a government-sponsored health plan, why not memorize all the things I had never had an opportunity to learn at age twelve.

From studying the sounds of the alphabet with Cecilia Dollar to grappling with prayers, trope and torah with Merrill Silver, I have encountered enormous love and dedication from extraordinary people who want to impart a skill that is precious to them. I have felt the warmth of smiling faces who have watched me slowly take on melodies and overcome shyness at the bima. And I have enjoyed sitting next to members eager to take me under their wing and explain the service. Even Bela says he appreciates the soft sounds of my Ashrei traveling up the stairs to his third floor office.

After only a year and a half, my Bnai Mitzvah study has been a deeply rewarding journey of Jewish literacy, commitment and friendship. It has also been, like our parshah, a stumbling through the wilderness as I built something from the unknown. I hope you will find my endeavor meaningful today, and perhaps, when you come up against your next challenge, you, too, will answer, “Why not?”