Avi Winokur
Graphic by Angelie Zaslavsky
Rabbi Avi Winokur has been a leader in many ways. He is warm and welcoming, but also insightful. His combination of intelligence and passion has brought many new and diverse members to our synagogue. Rabbi Winokur has a son who struggles with very serious health conditions. Watching the grace with which Rabbi Winokur handles this tremendous struggle inspires many members of the congregation to bear their own burdens better — including me. Rabbi Winokur inspires the Hebrew school students with his love of learning and interest in their own spiritual journeys. He spends many hours one on one with each b’nai mitzvah candidate, which makes the experience more meaningful. Because he has made it such a wonderful process, we are seeing adults becoming a bar or bat mitzvah, and many more who have become very engaged in adult education. Rabbi Winokur also teaches adult education classes and has spread Jewish learning throughout our community: members and non-members flock to his classes. Rabbi Winokur has been a leader in promoting the synagogue’s social justice efforts; recently, he spoke at rallies in support of school funding and fair wages. In the past five years, I have had breast cancer and my husband died, and Rabbi Winokur was there to support me through it all.
— Debby Freedman + 6 other nominations
It’s our birthday and we’re still celebrating!
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news.
This week we celebrate 129 years of the Forward. We’re proud of our origins as a Yiddish print publication serving Jewish immigrants. And we’re just as proud of what we’ve become today: A trusted source of Jewish news and opinion, available digitally to anyone in the world without paywalls or subscriptions.
We’ve helped five generations of American Jews make sense of the news and the world around them — and we aren’t slowing down any time soon.
As a nonprofit newsroom, reader donations make it possible for us to do this work. Support independent, agenda-free Jewish journalism and our board will match your gift in honor of our birthday!
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
