Adult Education Newsletter (September 2015)

The Adult Education Committee has been hard at work this summer in planning many events. (A list was sent with the High Holy day tickets in mid-August). The first events this year will be:

  • Sunday, October 25, 9:15 a.m.—A Discussion on Interfaith Marriage—Things you didn’t think about beforehand; Things you think about now!
  • Friday, October 30, 7:30 p.m.—A book discussion, Being Mortal, by Atul Gawande”—a physician’s exploration of aging, death, and the medical profession’s mishandling of both. Here’s what Amazon has to say about it:

    “In Being Mortal, bestselling author Atul Gawande tackles the hardest challenge of his profession: how medicine can not only improve life but also the process of its ending.

    “Medicine has triumphed in modern times, transforming birth, injury, and infectious disease from harrowing to manageable. But in the inevitable condition of aging and death, the goals of medicine seem too frequently to run counter to the interest of the human spirit. Nursing homes, preoccupied with safety, pin patients into railed beds and wheelchairs. Hospitals isolate the dying, checking for vital signs long after the goals of cure have become moot. Doctors, committed to extending life, continue to carry out devastating procedures that in the end extend suffering.

    “Gawande, a practicing surgeon, addresses his profession’s ultimate limitation, arguing that quality of life is the desired goal for patients and families. Gawande offers examples of freer, more socially fulfilling models for assisting the infirm and dependent elderly, and he explores the varieties of hospice care to demonstrate that a person’s last weeks or months may be rich and dignified.

    “Full of eye-opening research and riveting storytelling, Being Mortal asserts that medicine can comfort and enhance our experience even to the end, providing not only a good life but also a good end.”

The Adult Education Committee welcomes new members. The next meeting of the Adult Education Committee will be Monday, September 21 at 7:00 p.m.

We wish everyone a sweet & Happy New Year.

Shalom,
Ellen Rothberg, Adult Education Chair new message24