WOMEN
Women’s Spring Lunch brings joy and tears ometimes, a topic touches so close to one’s heart that it’s impossible to ignore it or turn away. On Wednesday, June 1, United Jewish Federation of Tidewater’s Women’s Cabinet hosted its annual Spring Lunch at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Virginia Beach. The topic that resonated with everyone there was…Ukraine. This was the first in-person Spring lunch since 2019 (due to COVID
restrictions) and Barbara Dudley, Women’s Cabinet chair, opened it with her thanks to all who helped to make this year’s Federation Community Campaign a success. She further thanked those who went “beyond” by supporting the Tidewater Ukraine Emergency Fund, whose funds will help meet the overwhelming needs of Jewish communities caught in the crossfire of the war with Russia. That support will undoubtedly grow in the months to come. Tidewater’s Jewish community will continue to assist in every way possible.
Laura Gross, UJFT president.
Sandy Katz, JDC.
Amy Zelenka
S
Women’s Spring Lunch. The first in-person lunch since 2019.
22 | JEWISH NEWS | June 27, 2022 | jewishnewsva.org
After installing returning Cabinet members and bidding farewell to those whose terms were ending (and who were rotating off Cabinet), Dudley thanked her outgoing co-chair, Mona Flax, for extending her term an extra year (thereby ensuring uninterrupted leadership at Cabinet meetings and events, even if one or the other of them began traveling once COVID restrictions were lifted!). Dudley presented Flax with a beautiful modern menorah. “Jewish tradition is replete with references to light,” said Dudley. “From ‘Let there be light…’ in the creation story… Barbara Dudley, Women’s Cabinet chair to the oft used phrase describing with Mona Flax, outgoing co-chair. the Jewish People as a ‘light unto the nations.’ That light unto the nations Red Rose, White Rose, Film Festival, Israel is the light of inspiration, which illumiFest, and other fundraising efforts of the nates a path and encourages others to Federation and Simon Family JCC. Dayenu! follow… and Mona has been that for all Ours is truly a remarkable community.” of us; inspiring others to join in buildAnd even more remarkable is the ing and strengthening Jewish community impact these campaigns are making here here and around the world. This menorah at home and in places around the Jewish is perfect for you; it combines traditional world. values with contemporary aspirations for The featured speaker for the lunch was a more just and equitable future.” Sandy Katz, senior director of Strategic A brief campaign report showed the Relations, at the American Jewish Joint success of this Distribution Committee ( JDC)—the year’s fundraising. Federation’s overseas service delivery Borrowing from the partner—who just returned from the Passover Haggadah, Polish border with Ukraine, where she Dudley listed some had been working with colleagues to of those successes: help meet the immediate and longer-term “Annual Campaign needs of Jews (and others) coming into in excess of $4.81 Poland (and surprisingly, some returning million. Dayenu! Add to Ukraine). to that an additional Katz brought three photographs with $678,000 raised her. They showed a handful of the reffor the Tidewater ugees she encountered during her time Ukraine Emergency in Poland and illustrated the incredible Fund. Dayenu! And challenges facing these families—almost another $750,000 all of them women and children and very raised for campaigns old men. These are children who will deal other than the with post-traumatic stress for a very long annual campaign— time, having experienced bombings and Patron of the Arts, witnessing death all around them—living
