Emanuel Welcomes Yechiel Bar-Chaim

Rabbi Marantz is excited to announce that Emanuel Congregation will be hosting guest speaker Yechiel Bar-Chaim on Saturday, November 9th and Sunday, the 10th. Yechiel’s sermon during Saturday’s service will focus on Moses As a Leader. Sunday he will discuss How Disabilities are Viewed in the Torah at 10:15 am, with a Q&A afterwards. Both talks will be held in the Sanctuary, and everyone is welcome to attend.

Mr. Bar-Chaim serves as an independent consultant to the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) and to Bader Philanthropies, Inc. of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He concentrates on finding smart projects to assist marginalized populations, principally Czech and Slovak Roma as well as Israeli Arabs and Bedouin with disabilities. His academic work includes degrees from Harvard, the Sorbonne, and Hebrew University in Jerusalem and served in the United States Signal Corps before emigrating to Israel in 1974. His humanitarian relief work includes direct transmigrant programs for Jews throughout the Cold War and its aftermath, particularly during the breakup of the former Yugoslavia and the war in Bosnia-Hercegovina, where he assisted La Benevolencija in their efforts to evacuate Sarajevo.

Born in Washington, D.C., for the past 50 years he has lived successively in Belgium, France, Israel, Austria, and then again in France (for 25 years). Since June, 2016, he lives and works contentedly in Prague. He is the father of two married children and the grandfather of four.