Travel and Food

The Lost Catacomb by Shifra Hochberg, Enigma Press, USA, 2014 By Dorothea Shefer-Vanson MEVASSERET ZION, Israel — Machinations, mischief and skullduggery in the Vatican, both in modern times and in the past, constitute the main theme of this interesting first novel by Shifra Hochberg. It’s my understanding that the leaders of the Catholic church were somehow involved in helping

By Eva Trieger SOLANA BEACH, California – The image of a successful life is fairly universal: a spacious home on a well-manicured lot, a relatively new car, and a job title that commands respect and admiration.  Throw in the ability to take a family vacation twice a year and enjoy fine dining and attend sporting

By Eileen Wingard SAN DIEGO — The Defiant Requiem: Verdi in Terezin, the remarkable concert-drama about music in the Nazi show ghetto of Terezin, created by Conductor Murry Sidlin, is a testament to the human spirit. It exemplifies how mankind can rise above the most oppressive conditions. A choir of 150 inmates, replenished frequently because

By Natasha Josefowitz SAN DIEGO — “Laugh, and the world laughs with you; Weep, and you weep alone.” These are the first two lines of Ella Wheeler Wilcox’s 1883 poem “Solitude.” Little did she know that this thought was the precursor of contemporary cognitive science, which has discovered the mechanism behind empathy: mirror neurons. When we

By Eileen Wingard LA JOLLA, California — Three mothers will be reading the poetry of their daughters at the final evening of Jewish Poets—Jewish Voices, “From Generation to Generation,” Tuesday evening, May 12, at 7 p.m.. at the Astor Library in the Lawrence Family JCC. Actually, my daughter, Harriet Wingard, will be flying in from Portland, where she

By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal SAN DIEGO — Which is the better motivator of performing a mitzvah: desire, obligation, or guilt? The answer to this question formed the subtext of a discussion we had on Wednesday during Tifereth Israel Synagogue’s Ritual Committee meeting. Some members said they came to morning minyan because they wanted to. Others said