Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By richards on March 16, 2015

As 9-year-old Spencer Steinmetz and his Hebrew school classmates smeared peanut butter and jelly on sandwich bread at Bolton Street Synagogue on Sunday, other young members of the congregation were performing a play for the elderly and disabled, cleaning up storm drains or writing cards for child abuse victims.

"They're for other people who don't really have it," Steinmetz said of the sandwiches as well as medical and art supply kits the congregation will take to various local charities.

And their projects were among thousands of others around the world on what was dubbed Good Deeds Day, an event Israeli businesswoman Shari Arison founded in 2007. The North Baltimore synagogue joined in on the event in keeping with its own social justice mission, and to help contribute to a greater good, volunteers said.

"It's great to have an organized day where you can have a significant impact that you can't have as an individual," said Melissa Zieve, who teaches fifth-graders in the synagogue's Hebrew school.

Good Deeds Day began with a few thousand volunteers in 2007, but had grown to more than 580,000 participants in 50 countries last year. This year's event was expected to grow to 900,000 volunteers in 58 countries.

Service activities tied to the event were going on from coast-to-coast Sunday in the United States. Volunteers made fleece blankets for a children's hospital and performed art therapy with the elderly in San Diego, organized a blood drive and made sandwiches for the homeless in Chicago, and made brown-bag lunches with inspirational cards in Miami, according to the event's website.

More than 400 events in Europe and Asia included park cleanups in Berlin, storytelling in Paris, computer donations in the Philippines and trash collection in rivers in India. In Africa, more than 8,000 projects included basic hygiene, sanitation and water use lessons and efforts to care for orphans and street children, according to the site.

At Bolton Street, the aim was to teach children about the needs others face and the importance of helping those who are less fortunate. The event began with a slideshow depicting where and to whom the projects would have an impact the sandwiches were to be sent to St. Vincent de Paul of Baltimore's lunch program, the art kits to the Baltimore Child Abuse Center, and the medical supplies to Youth Empowered Society's Baltimore center for homeless youth.

Other children performed a Purim play at North Oaks Retirement Community in Pikesville. And others trekked around neighborhoods near the synagogue on Cold Spring Lane cleaning storm drains of trash and other debris and spray-painting "Do Not Dump" signs onto the curbs, part of a state Department of Natural Resources program to help protect the Chesapeake Bay.

Congregation member Theresa Nicol coordinated with the various charities to organize the event, to promote the synagogue's social mission and to explain its importance to the congregation's youngest members.

Excerpt from:

Bolton Street Synagogue takes part in global 'Good Deeds Day'

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