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March 5, 2004/Adar 12 5764, Vol. 56, No. 24
On a mission to transform the world
LEISAH NAMM
Managing Editor
Temple Chai will honor Rabbi Bill and Susan Berk for the couple's work for the community.
Photo courtesy of Nora Perlmutter
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He's the head rabbi at one of the largest synagogues in Phoenix and has been nationally recognized for educational programs he created. She works as a community liaison with Hospice of the Valley and her husband credits her with many of the ideas and innovations behind Temple Chai programs.
Together they raise five children, ages 7-22.
Temple Chai members will pay tribute to Rabbi Bill and Susan Berk at the synagogue's annual fund-raiser on March 20 at the Radisson Resort in Scottsdale.
"They believe in the Jewish community and reaching out to all Jews," says Ava Keenen, Temple Chai director of education, who served on the search committee that brought Berk to Temple Chai in 1983.
"Rabbi and Susan Berk are passionately committed to bringing tikkun olam to the world," says Nora Perlmutter, a former Temple Chai president who, with Lory Fischler, is co-chairwoman of the tribute.
"They face this difficult task in front of them with purpose and perseverance. ... Together, they are a dynamic force with which to be reckoned."
What inspires this couple to do what they do?
"My sense is that the whole world is living in a time of great identify crisis," and the Jewish community is "definitely living in a time of identity crisis," Rabbi Berk says. "The call of the hour is for transformation (and) for learning and experiences that will help us grow and become who we need to be and who we can be.
"I've devoted my work to that vision and I'm trying to model it for my congregation and trying to create experiences that will increase the odds that it can happen."
Not only has "Rabbi Berk brought amazing educational programs to Temple Chai, he has had a tremendous impact on the education in the Greater Phoenix Jewish community," Keenen says.
Last month, Berk was presented with the Covenant Award, an award recognizing outstanding Jewish educators in North America, presented by the Covenant Foundation.
Examples of his programs include the Advanced Studies and Beit Midrash Chai programs, intensive adult education programs that include classes, extensive reading, journaling, discussion groups, a weekend retreat and a trip to Israel.
"He shines as a community leader and has tremendously enriched the lives of many, many people, including mine," Keenen says.
Susan Berk says her involvement in the community stems from wanting to make a difference in the Jewish world and in people's lives. "The Jewish family is a wonderful family to be a part of and ours in particular here in the Valley and at Temple Chai is an incredibly precious one."
Strong individuals
Before Rabbi Berk attended rabbinical school, he taught junior high school for three years.
"I loved it, but I wanted to continue my own learning," he says. "I wanted to know where I came from." He notes that while today's universities often offer Jewish studies programs, in those days, "if you wanted to know a lot about Judaism, you had to go to rabbinical school."
He says many reasons led him to the rabbinate, but a main one was that he fell in love with what he calls the "mitzvah system," a way of transforming the world.
As a student at University of California at Berkeley, he "came to believe that the Jews had a great answer for how we transformed the world. I wanted to know more about it and I wanted to teach it."
Studying the Holocaust in college also led him to the rabbinate. When "I realized that Hitler's number one goal was to kill all the Jews, it overcame me that it just can't be the case that the Jewish people will be wiped out or just assimilated away. Hitler would have a posthumous victory and it cannot happen.
"I wanted to devote whatever talent I had or effort to try to keep the Jewish people alive."
He graduated from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion and in 1983, came to Phoenix to accept a position at Temple Chai.
He still remembers the nine-hour-long interview - "an entire day with only a break for lunch," he says.
One of the things he recalls sharing in his interview was his theory that he has to keep growing and learning and if he does so, the community will follow.
"I think I've learned that that relationship is really true," he says. "I'm very grateful my community has given me the opportunity to have sabbaticals and to go to conferences and to really keep my own learning going."
Before Berk arrived at Temple Chai, membership was made up of about 100 families and the only programming was Friday night services and a small religious school, says Marty Mullen, a member since 1978.
Over the past two decades, the congregation has grown to 1,100 families, a Friday night service that draws more than 300 people weekly, up to five Saturday morning Shabbat services each week and extensive education programs, Mullen says. Berk was also behind the founding of the Shalom Center, a resource center that provides educational programs, support groups and spiritual development.
"All of this was from his motivation and inspiration," Mullen says. "He provided the medium for all of this to be accomplished."
Susan received her undergraduate nursing degree from the University of Texas at Austin and then a master's degree in nursing from George Mason University. She began her nursing career as an operating room nurse and advanced to head nurse, then nursing administrator. From 1982-1985, she served as a captain in the United States Air Force in Sacramento, Calif., as an operating room nurse.
"Susan has led many of the programs and instituted many of the new programs we've had over the years," Mullen says. "The two of them together have been an inspiration for the membership growth, for programming - for the life that you can experience at Temple Chai."
Kathy Hoffman, a longtime temple member and friend, says she is impressed with the Berks' commitment to the entire Jewish community.
"They really both keep learning to keep giving," she says. "They keep studying and trying to improve themselves just so they can share that with the community and improve things and make things better. ... They're always trying to improve themselves to improve the world."
Life as a couple
Susan and Bill met after Susan joined the synagogue more than 12 years ago.
"We had a number of people who tried to set the two of us up with each other and they didn't know we were already going out," Susan says. "For the longest time when we dated, he always took me to Tempe on our dates. I just figured, I guess he really likes Tempe." Because she was a congregant, he was trying to keep his personal life separate from his professional life, she explains.
The Berks married 11 years ago and together have five children: Sam, 22, Joe, 20, Isaac, 17, Ruth, 9, and Gavriella, 7.
Six weeks after the wedding, they took their honeymoon in Israel - with Rabbi Berk's oldest son and 80 congregants.
Hoffman, who helped plan the couple's wedding reception, says one of the things she respects most about the Berks is their generosity. "They just open their home and their hearts to everyone all the time." She also credits them both with keeping a sense of humor in times of adversity and living what they believe. "You don't meet finer people in your whole lifetime," she says.
"I want to credit Susan for so many wonderful things," Rabbi Berk says of his wife. "She's been such an important partner for me. ... Somebody who's pushed me in the right direction and challenged me."
"He's the bema guy," Susan says. "I prefer to just quietly be behind the scenes." She was touched to hear that the synagogue wanted to honor them as a couple. "We feel like we have an incredible partnership, but it's special to have it acknowledged by others."
Details
- What: Tribute to Rabbi William and Susan Berk
- Who: Temple Chai
- When: 6:30 p.m. Saturday, March 20
- Where: Radisson Resort & Spa, 7171 N. Scottsdale Road, Scottsdale
- Cost: $50
- Call: 602-971-1234
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