Facilitating Difficult Conversations: A 3-part Workshop for Rabbis Creating Tight-Knit Community Across Lines of Difference and Conflict
Facilitating Difficult Conversations is back! Atra piloted this workshop last summer and we are excited to be offering it again this winter.
This workshop is a transformative three-part series designed specifically for Jewish spiritual leaders. In today’s challenging landscape, we understand the weight you carry as community leaders, and we’re here to support you with the essential skills and resources needed to navigate and nurture thriving Jewish communities amidst differing viewpoints.
Over three sessions, you’ll be equipped with the tools to skillfully navigate trauma, conflict, and communal healing. From active listening techniques to conflict de-escalation strategies, you’ll learn how to turn sources of tension into opportunities for Jewish connection and community building. Our comprehensive curriculum includes practical exercises, role-playing scenarios, and a “train the trainer” component, empowering you to share these crucial skills with key leaders in your community, ensuring that the journey towards community resilience is a collective effort.
Upcoming Workshop Dates
Upcoming dates to come.
All 3 sessions of the workshop will meet online, and will be limited to 15 people.
Participation Fee
The price of the workshop is $250. If the price is prohibitive for your participation, please reach out to us at esther@atrarabbis.org. We aspire to make this experience as accessible as possible for all rabbis.
Workshop Facilitators
Cara Raich, a former attorney, is a New York-based conflict consultant and facilitator who leads institutions, organizations, museums, religious leaders, companies, partnerships, family businesses and families through challenging situations with clarity and sensitivity. Cara’s skills include mediation, conflict resolution, facilitation, crisis management, employee relations, respectful workplace trainings, anti sexual harassment trainings and advising on governance matters. Cara is a “how” expert. She knows “how” to navigate the most stressful, conflicted environments. Cara uses this skill to lead productive conversations across lines of difference and complexity. She makes sure all voices are meaningfully heard. Cara creates order from chaos and clarity in moments of confusion so her clients can take productive action when the way forward seems uncertain.
Brigid Goggin is the Senior Director of Programs at Atra: Center for Rabbinic Innovation. Prior to joining Atra, Brigid spent nine years at Temple Israel of Boston, where she implemented the strategic vision of the synagogue through creative and responsive program design. In close collaboration with clergy and local partners, she developed and grew new initiatives addressing the spiritual, educational, and social needs of the Greater Boston Jewish community. Brigid is originally from Tulsa, Oklahoma and earned her BA in Applied Anthropology from Hendrix College in Conway, Arkansas. She served in AmeriCorps for two years at an intergenerational literacy nonprofit in Boston, Massachusetts, before earning her MTS from Harvard Divinity School and Certificate in Religious Studies and Education, cosponsored by Harvard Graduate School of Education.