Rabbi Oren Postrel has made it his duty to serve a part of the Jewish community that is often undervalued.
As the new rabbi at the Reutlinger Community for Jewish Living in Danville, his work is geared towards the elderly, “a population we may overlook in mainstream congregational life,” he said.
“A lot of our preoccupation as Jews centers around survival — we tend to focus on the coming generations and the parents with young families. Meanwhile, we’re overlooking these souls that are also in our midst right now,” said Postrel, 39.
“There are so many stories and so much wisdom seniors can offer us.”
Postrel, who resides in San Ramon, joined Reutlinger as its full-time rabbi in September. A San Francisco native whose parents and siblings all reside in the Bay Area, he has made what he called “a gradual entry” into serving older adults.
He previously held a position at the Jewish Home and Hospital in the Bronx; before that he worked as the director of education at a Jewish community center in Long Island, teaching Hebrew and other Jewish topics to seniors.
“I wanted to have them enrich my rabbinate and learn from them,” he said, referring to this work with seniors as “a wonderful exchange.”
Postrel received his undergraduate degree in the history of art from U.C. Berkeley. But during his junior year, spent abroad at Hebrew University in Israel, he realized, “I was far more connected with Jewish tradition than with the progression of visual arts. I found Judaism was much more dynamic and spoke to my soul much more clearly than artwork and its criticism.”
Prior to rabbinical school, Postrel taught religious school at Temple Beth El in Berkeley. He then received his ordination from Hebrew Union College in 1993 and served as a congregational rabbi in Paris as well as in Kalamazoo, Mich.
While in Europe, where all his work was conducted in French, he was surprised to find a much more traditional version of liberal Judaism than that practiced in the United States.
The Reutlinger community — which combines Jewish culture and tradition with services and residential living for seniors — has brought about a whole new set of challenges.
Aside from the liturgical aspects of his job, Postrel is expected to provide a great deal of pastoral counseling for the 164 residents, particularly in the area of community interaction. Since Reutlinger residents live and worship together, this is “greatly different from conventional congregational life,” he said.
Postrel often serves family members and friends of Reutlinger residents, as well.
“I make Shabbat each week,” he said, “with a huge extended family.”
In addition, Postrel, who already knows more than 75 percent of the residents by name, is on-hand day to day to lend a friendly ear and to help the residents through health and death issues.
“I deal with a very large amount of existential questions. I struggle to work through those questions while relying on Jewish tradition.”
For example, the story of Chanukah, he said, provides a parallel between Jewish tradition and the search for one’s meaning: It shows how the Jews “maintained our sense of community and mission as Jews and refused to be undone by the forces of the larger society.”
Postrel stressed that this lesson is an important one since the residents of Reutlinger are “not here to die. They’re here, really, to live.”
Having grown up in Jewish environments it is only natural that “they would want to continue, when they need extra care, in a Jewish home,” he said. “That includes the study of the Torah and keeping abreast of the current events and activities” of the Jewish community.
“I’m just one of a larger staff that helps to ensure they lead full lives.”