Jewish students across the Lone Star State excitedly pronounced the second-annual Grand Texas Intercollegiate Shabbaton to be even bigger and better than last year’s event.
Hosted once again by collegians at Texas A&M University in College Station, the collection of networking events, workshops and spiritually inspiring talks was attended by hundreds of students from more than half a dozen colleges.
“It’s going to be really big!” Naomi Heller, a junior and student board president of the Chabad-Lubavitch Jewish Student Center serving A&M, reported just days before the Feb. 19 opening sessions.
She was looking forward to “seeing so many kids my age who care about their heritage,” said the Dallas area native. “Plus, I love meeting new people!”
Among other items on its agenda, the Shabbaton included a Friday night talk by guest scholar Sara Esther Crispe, editor of JewishWoman.org, who spoke about the Jewish mystical understanding of relationships.
“The goal is to show how insights from Jewish mysticism can enhance their relationships with others and with themselves as well,” explained Crispe.
“The connections we discuss will help them develop and better understand their inner strength, potential and power, and how to translate that in their day-to-day lives.”
Other workshops explored the moral obligation to be happy, a look into the Torah’s perspective on body art, and textual-based study of the Talmud.
Rabbi Shimon Lazaroff, director of the regional Chabad-Lubavitch headquarters in Houston, led a Chasidic gathering for students on Friday night, and a Saturday night drum circle will follow a Havdallah ceremony marking the close of Shabbat.
As with other regional collegiate Shabbatons across North America, including gatherings in California and Canada last month and at Bighamton University in New York in last fall, the Texas weekend was sponsored by the Chabad on Campus International Foundation.
Sam Caplan, a sophomore psychology major at A&M, which has an estimated 1,000 Jewish student to U.T.’s 5,000, echoed Heller’s view.
“It’s nice for our community to meet a bigger community,” she explained. “Even though [our group] is not very large, we’re very close.”
Manya Lazaroff, co-director of the A&M Chabad House, says that one of the goals of the Shabbaton was to unify Jewish students from across the region.
Even the University of Oklahoma sent a delegation, joining the University of North Texas, Rice University, the University of Houston, Blinn College and Texas State University at S. Marcos.
“We always want to do more,” said Lazaroff, who opened the Chabad House with her husband, Rabbi Yossi Lazaroff, in 2007. “You would never know that we’ve only been here three years, there’s so many people coming and going.”
you guys rock!!
Longhorns, where you at!??!?!??!?!!?
-NP
Keep up the great work everyone. So proud of you Davida. We always knew you would be an amazing Shlucha. I miss you here at Mayanot. Keep it up girl. Love ya Sis Chana Miriam.
rochie! we spotted you from israel! 🙂 good job!
Go Schmuklers!!!
GO MY HOMETOWN!!
Go doda Yaeli!!! woo hooo
Go Michallll K 🙂
WHOAAA TEXAS!!!!!! 🙂 🙂 🙂
go Rochie Shaw
Yossi and Manya you are the best.
Keep up the holy Shlichus