By Serena Pollack
Special to The Chronicle
Last week’s double Torah portion, Tazria and Metzora, deals with impurity as a result of skin diseases (leprosy) and the laws about purification rituals. The parshah literally spells out how to clean the walls of your home after dealing with leprosy.
In light of the portion, it seemed very fitting that 18 members of the United Jewish Communities’ National Young Leadership Cabinet, of which I am a member, spent last week in New Orleans on a volunteer mission.
We came from all over the country — San Diego, Dallas, D.C., Chicago, Charlotte, Philadelphia, New Jersey, and New York. Our task was simple: do whatever we can to help.
At first we thought it was strange that we would not be volunteering in the Ninth Ward but we came to understand that there was nothing left to do in the Ninth Ward; that neighborhood was completely wiped out.
Instead, we cleaned two homes in the Lakeview neighborhood of New Orleans.
Lakeview is the part of town where many of us would have lived; it is where a large portion of the Jewish community lived.
These homes were completely destroyed. As we entered the homes to clear away furniture and years of memories and personal items, each of us said these were homes where we imagined our parents or grandparents living.
We were told to wear clothes that would be thrown away; work gloves and masks were necessary, and we could not stay in these houses for more than a few moments at a time because of the mold and bacteria.
Eighteen of us who had never previously done this type of work (and likely never imagined we would) came together and accomplished something amazing. I was particularly proud of our group, which included 16 women and two men.
In just under two hours we completely cleaned out one house. And as we coughed up the mold and bacteria we had breathed in that house, we were determined to continue until we had accomplished what we set out to do.
We finished our day with a tour of a shul called Congregation Beth Israel. This was the shul in which people used rafts in an attempt to rescue the Torah scrolls, which were ultimately too water-logged to save.
That synagogue was the only one in a five state region to have a daily Orthodox minyan. Its president’s grandfather was a founding member. Congregants loved their shul; there is no simpler way to say it.
This building, however, was completely wiped out. The bimah had washed away and its members had found fish living in the area where it had been. Hundreds of years worth of Judaica was ruined and Torah scroll covers and talitot (prayer shawls) that had been soaked and moldy were draped over of one of the shul’s remaining railings.
The shul is what hit me most. I have been fortunate enough to travel and to see many synagogues in different areas of the country. Some of these had been affected by pogroms, the Holocaust, Communism, and even terrorism. But none was as completely wiped away as Beth Israel.
Beth Israel was, in essence, in my own back yard. This completely unfathomable amount of destruction had happened in my own back yard, and it had happened to my own community.
I am so proud to be a part of the National Young Leadership Cabinet. It is an incredible group of people committed to philanthropy and Judaism and making sure that Jews help Jews, no matter what.
But to help the Jewish community of New Orleans fully rebuild will take a collective effort. We can see the photos, read the news, and hear the stories, but until you see it, you can’t understand. I didn’t.
We need to keep sending gift cards, money, and we need, more than anything, to go to New Orleans and help. Maybe this will be going to jazz festivals or spending money in the French Quarter or maybe organizing a group to go and volunteer together.
I challenge each one of you and your community to say “Hineni,” “Here I am,” and to help, however you can.
Native Milwaukeean Serena Pollack, sepollack@gmail.com, serves the Jewish United Fund/Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago as campaign co-chair of the Young Lawyers Division and co-chair of the Lion of Judah Endowment’s recruitment for women 45 and younger. In Milwaukee, she co-chaired the Milwaukee Jewish Federation’s Visions young leadership development program in 2002-03.
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