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Rabbi Melanie Aron

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Welcome to our homepage! I am Melanie Aron, Rabbi of Congregation Shir Hadash since July of 1990. I am a Reform Rabbi and an ordinee of the Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion. Before coming to California, I served a small congregation in Brooklyn, New York, and was also the assistant rabbi at a suburban New Jersey congregation. I grew up in the Conservative movement, but made the switch during college. It was a combination of the push of the Conservative movement's "gradualist" approach to women's equality and the pull of getting to know many of the Hebrew Union College faculty members while growing up in Cincinnati. As a teenager, I was very active in Habonim, a Labor Zionist youth movement, and at one point I seriously considered making aliyah and living in Israel permanently.

The Reform movement covers such a wide expanse these days that people sometimes ask me where I fall within its boundaries. In terms of personal practice and ritual observance, I am probably on the traditional end of the Reform Jewish spectrum, while theologically and socially, I probably fall more on the left. Our congregation has identified outreach as a particular focus, and I have felt comfortable helping to make that an important part of our mission. We have a variety of programs geared toward interfaith couples and families, and encourage non-Jewish spouses to participate in the congregation as fully as they feel is comfortable and authentic for them. I feel that worship is an important part of a congregation's life, and have instituted regular (non-Bar/Bat Mitzvah) Saturday morning services as well as holiday morning services at our congregation. Though not a musician, I have a strong interest in Jewish music and encourage the congregation to continue to grow in this area. I continue to get a great deal of satisfaction from teaching, particularly the teaching of classes for adults.

In our local community, I sit on Kaiser Hospital's Medical Ethics Committee and am on the steering committee of the Interfaith Coalition for Race, Religion, Economic and Social Justice, an offshoot of the National Council of Christians and Jews. I have participated in Silicon Valley's American Leadership Forum class VIII and have been involved in our local Los Gatos clergy council. I am often asked to speak on topics relating to Women and Judaism, but am delighted when I am invited to speak about other general Jewish topics as well.

My husband teaches at the University of California at Santa Cruz. We have three children, and try to maintain our sanity by keeping our lives as simple as possible.

Rabbi Melanie Aron