We are excited to share a new “track” concept at Rabbinic Training Institute (RTI) this year! The Family Systems Intensive is by application AND only available after you have registered for RTI from January 12 - 16, 2025, to be held at The Pearlstone Center, Reisterstown, MD.
In recent years, many colleagues have shared that counseling couples, both pre-marriage and after marriage, has become more complex. This is especially the case for couples where one partner is of another faith background.
This year we will introduce a unique track at RTI, where a cohort of participants will explore these counseling issues and skills in depth. Led by Jake Morrill, an ordained Unitarian Universalist minister, a licensed marriage and family therapist, and an expert in Bowen Family Systems Theory, we will learn approaches and skills necessary to better guide couples through articulating their identities individually and as a couple. We will also explore how to help them discern how this relates to the integrity of the narratives, rituals, symbols and faith statements of the Jewish wedding ceremony. Finally, we will develop skills to avoid triangles, manage anxieties and differentiate needs for each couple, freeing the rabbi to represent the meaning and integrity of the tradition.
In addition to family systems theory, we plan to help colleagues think more deeply about rabbinic authority, identity formation and the power of religious experience in service of shifting from postures of communal approval and demography to a Torah emphasizing the power of particularity. In this track, participants will be able to choose a Limmud experience in the first session of each day and an evening group. Second Limmud and professional development will be together in this intensive.
Space is FULL for the Family Systems Track; please reach out to Ilana Garber with any questions.