In This Issue:

1. MOTAS/MOTBH SEDER 3/30: HELP NEEDED / SIGN UP NOW
2. L’DOUGH ‘DOUGH – SUN 3/16
3. NCAA SQUARES SALES NOW OPEN
4. ANNUAL APPEAL NOW OPEN
5. DINING OUT AT CHIS – MON APR 7
6. MARCH MEMBERSHIP MEETING MINUTES
7. IN CLOSING

(* indicates updated items)

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From the Editor: The goal of the Weekly is to get MoTAS members the information they need on upcoming activities, and then get out of the way. If you have any information on MoTAS activities you need to get out to the membership, please contact the Weekly Editor at cybermaven@tasnorthridge-motas.org.

1. MOTAS/MOTBH SEDER 3/30: HELP NEEDED / SIGN UP NOW

Our next big MoTAS event is our joint Mens Seder with the Men of Temple Beth Hillel (and we’re not exclusive — men from other congregations are welcome as well). The event is Sunday, 3/30/2025, starting at 5pm.

First and foremost: WE NEED YOUR HELP. We need people to help shop, setup, and cleanup. We need people to bring (ideally, donate) some of the ritual food that’s not being purchased or catered. We are also conducting a TASTE-OFF for Charosis and Gefilte Fish, so we need folks to show their best preparation skills and bring items to taste. Would you like to help with any of these? We have a volunteer sign up sheet at https://volunteersignup.org/EHHEY , or you can email me at faigin@cahighways.org.

We also need people to attend the seder. We’re hoping for 20-30 folks to attend, if not more. You can sign up directly at https://tasmotas.ticketleap.com/25-03-brotherhood-seder/. Here are some specifics about the seder; for more details, see https://wp.tasnorthridge-motas.org/activities/mens-seder/ :

• Where and when: Temple Ahavat Shalom, 18200 Rinaldi Place, Northridge CA 91326. Doors open at 5pm; we’ll start at 530pm. Our plan is to be done by 8pm-ish.
• The cost is planned to stay the same as last year: $40 per person.
• Dinner will be catered by Alibaba Restaurant in Granada Hills. See the sign up page for the menu.
• There will be a “taste-off” event for Charoset and Gefilte Fish. We’ll be asking the men of both brotherhoods to bring in their favorite home-prepared Charoset and Gefilte Fish. We’ll start doing sign-up sheets at the upcoming meetings. Sign up at https://volunteersignup.org/EHHEY.
• We’re hoping for MoTAS members to prepare and bring in some of the other ritual items, notably eggs, horseradish, and such.
• MoTAS will provide drinks (including the wine) and the matzah, although donations are welcome.
• We will be using a modified and pared down version of our Brotherhood Haggadah from previous years that incorporates content from the MRJ Mens Seder, that Beth Hillel seder, and a few other sources. We expect it to be significantly shorter than our previous version, modulo some of the discussions from the MRJ haggadah. Click here to see the current version.

You can sign up directly at https://tasmotas.ticketleap.com/25-03-brotherhood-seder/. Sign up to volunteer or for the taste-off at https://volunteersignup.org/EHHEY.

2. L’DOUGH ‘DOUGH – SUN 3/16

L’Dough V’Dough is a Holocaust Museum LA program that invites participants to braid and bake challah. As our challah bakes, we will hear a survivor’s family’s story of their survival and perseverance. This program will be at TAS on Sunday, March 16 at 9:30am. RSVP required by March 4. RSVS to Scott Gore: scott22g@msn.com, 508.361.9565. For more information contact Scott. More details at (www.holocaustmuseumla.org/programs).

3. NCAA SQUARES SALES NOW OPEN

Now that football season is officially over, it’s time for basketball and the craziness known as the Final Four, in early April. Once again, MoTAS is happy to offer you the opportunity to help raise some needed funds for special TAS projects, and maybe you’ll earn some $$ along the way. In other words: NCAA Squares are now on sale. To get all the information (and in some cases, more than you could ever want), go to http://squares.tasnorthridge-motas.org/ where you’ll find the instructions, a sign-up form you can download and then print, and a link if you wish to order your spaces online. Registration closes Tuesday, April 1, 2025 at 6pm, unless otherwise announced.

To summarize: each name on the board can have up to 3 spaces. The squares are priced at $36 each. The game is for both the men’s and women’s tournament (semifinal two games each, and final games), so there are 12 opportunities to be a winner, since there is a winner at the half and final score. If the board is fully subscribed at all 100 spaces, the payout is $150 per win. Once again, we’ll use our “tie-breaker” method to determine a winner if a winning square is unsold (If there are unsold squares, the payouts will be adjusted.) The tie-breaker is your prediction of the total number of points both teams will score in any game, for example, if you think the final score will be 82-61, your number = 143. Here’s a hint for those who are unfamiliar (or don’t really care….): the average score for the men’s tournament for the last two years was 147, and the average score for the women’s tournament was 134. You get only one tie-breaker per person, so choose wisely.

4. ANNUAL APPEAL NOW OPEN

The MoTAS Shabbat marks the start of our annual appeal. MoTAS does not collect membership dues — we depend on contributions from our membership to do what we do, and to help Temple Ahavat Shalom. You should be receiving the appeal letter shortly. To contribute online or to print a donation form, just visit support.tasnorthridge-motas.org or go directly to https://wp.tasnorthridge-motas.org/about/support-motas/. The online direct donation page is here; the link to our Box account with the downloadable PDF form is here.

5. DINING OUT AT CHIS – MON APR 7

Would you like an easy way to help MoTAS financially? How about taking your family to dinner. The MoTAS “Dining Does Good” allows you to go out to dinner, and have the restaurant donate a portion of your check support the Men of TAS. Our April Dining Does Good” will be April 7Monday,   at Chi’s Chinese, 9635 Reseda Blvd. Northridge, CA 91324,  (818) 886-6928, chis_chinese@verizon.net.

How do you get a flyer? You can find a flyer for the event at https://wp.tasnorthridge-motas.org/activities/dining/ (click on the image of the flyer) or download PDF from our Dropbox account . Once you are at the Dropbox version of the flyer: [NOTE: We are experimenting with Dropbox, let me know if this is easier.]

• If you are on a PC or Mac using a browser: (1) look in the upper right corner. Under the filename, you’ll see “FILE”. Click on that, and you can either PRINT or DOWNLOAD..
• If you using a browser on an Android phone: This takes you directly to the PDF. You can download from there.
• If you are using some other method, please send it to me and I’ll include it on this list.
• If you can’t figure this out at all: Drop me an email at cybermaven@tasnorthridge-motas.org , and I’ll send you the PDF as an attachment.

We really encourage you to come and support these events: we raise a little extra funds for our work, but more importantly, we come together and break bread as a Temple family on a regular basis. It is a real joy to walk into a neighborhood restaurant and see your Temple friends, to sit down and share a table and talk. This is the heart and goal of MoTAS: Building Relationships.

6. MARCH MEMBERSHIP MEETING MINUTES

Men of Temple Ahavat Shalom General Meeting Minutes

Date: Sunday, March 9, 2025, at TAS

Presiding: President Larry Hoffman

Members Present: Larry Hoffman (President), Hal Bass (Secretary), Les Birken, Daniel Faigin, Gordon Lester, Bob Levine, Joel Lowell, Roger Lowe (Treasurer), Barry Mann, Chuck Mondrus, Jeff Neiman, Larry Pfefer (Immediate Past President), Russ Rapoport, Jim Schwartz, Bill Shapiro, Bernie Singer, Marshall Waldman, Scott Yollis (VP)

Guest: Ellen Lowe

Coffee & Breakfast: Bob Levine, Roger Lowe, Scott Yollis

Question of the Day: How are you doing with the egg shortage?

President’s Report:

• Larry H once again congratulated our 2025 MoTAS Man of the Year Howard Miller and offered a hearty mazel tov to Daniel Faigin as Regional MRJ Man of the Year announced last night at the awards dinner held at Temple Beth Tikvah in Fullerton, which 190 people attended.
• Dining Does Good: On Monday, April 7, Chi’s in Northridge will be on the menu. Be sure to present the flyer available on the MoTAS website to your server or cashier. If you know of other restaurants which would be good venues for this program, let our Dining Does Good coordinator, Barry Mann, know.
• The Poker Tournament takes place this evening in the social hall.
• TAS will celebrate Purim on March 14. There will be a dinner for which reservations are required and the Oneg Shabbat will have a theme inspired by “Wicked.”
• L’Dough V’Dough, a joint activity of MoTAS and Sisterhood, on Sunday, March 16, will feature Holocaust survivors and/or their family members from the Museum of Tolerance together with challah baking.
• Daniel Faigin said this year’s Men’s Seder with Temple Beth Hillel of Valley Village will be held at TAS, Sunday evening, March 30. The dinner will be catered by the Ali Baba Persian Restaurant of Granada Hills. Daniel circulated a list of additional food items, such as gefilte fish, or ritual objects, for attendees to bring. For further details, see https://wp.tasnorthridge-motas.org/activities/mens-seder/. To sign up directly, go to https://tasmotas.ticketleap.com/25-03-brotherhood-seder/.
• The MoTAS Annual Appeal is now under way. Donations can be made through the MoTAS website.
• Per Bob Levine, sales of NCAA March Madness Sports Squares are doing well. He and Kathy Pullman are considering the possibility of adding the NBA finals to Sports Squares.

Roger Lowe’s Treasurer’s Report as of 03/07/2025:

• (emailed version only)

New Business:

• Howard Miller and Larry Pfefer of the Nominating Committee announced the slate of officers for 2025-26: President, Scott Gore; Vice Presidents, Howard Schnee and Scott Yollis; Treasurer, Roger Lowe; Secretary, Hal Bass; Immediate Past President, Larry Hoffman. Nominations of other candidates for these offices are due Friday, April 25, and should be submitted to the chair of the Nominating Committee, Howard Miller. The election will take place at our May 4 meeting, and new one-year terms will begin July 1.
• Marshall Waldman for himself and Howard Schnee reviewed a list of items needed by the San Gabriel Valley Jewish community as it recovers from the devastation wrought by January’s wildfires. A Reform congregation, the Pasadena Jewish Temple & Center, on the border of Pasadena and Altadena, was destroyed in the conflagration. Howard Miller moved, and Joel Lowell seconded, a motion to provide $250 from Sports Squares to purchase ice cream for the children.
• Our annual Shabbabaque will take place Friday evening, June 13.
• Flyers were distributed about an MRJ Men’s Retreat to be held at the Dovid Ovid Retreat Center in Running Springs, Friday-Sunday, June 6-8. $360 per person when sharing a room, $460 for a single room.

Today’s meeting was abbreviated so MoTAS members and other congregants could watch a film about racial and ethnic discrimination based on the celebrated book, “Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents,” by Isabel Wilkerson. Tyree Wieder and Diane Levine introduced the film and moderated the discussion following the movie.

Next Meeting: The next General Membership Meeting will take place Sunday, April 6, 2025, at 8:45 am. The main order of business will be the preparation of Yom HaShoah candles for mailing to congregants. Yom HaShoah begins at sundown Wednesday, April 23, and ends 24 hours later.

Respectfully submitted,

Hal Bass/Secretary

IN CLOSING

As always, remember that the Men of Temple Ahavat Shalom is *your* organization. Keep up to date on our activities at http://www.tasnorthridge-motas.org/ and participate. Sign up for our action alert list at http://tinyurl.com/motas-action-alert. We want to serve all the men of Temple Ahavat Shalom and welcome new participants from the TAS membership. Join our Facebook group and “follow” our website. Join the MoTAS Google Group at https://groups.google.com/g/tas-motas (you may need to be logged into your Google account, if you have one). Come be part of the Men of Temple Ahavat Shalom!