Death Over Dinner - Jewish Edition Comes to Los Angeles
Shane Hankins
Reboot is proud to be the recipient of a Continuation of Funding grant from the Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles to scale Death Over Dinner - Jewish Edition by working with local communities and individuals in Los Angeles. Death Over Dinner aims to address end-of-life concepts by inviting people to host dinners with the goal of sparking conversations and sharing experiences around death.
The Jewish Edition, piloted with IKAR over two years through a Cutting Edge grant in 2016, features curated articles, conversation cards, videos and other content which allow hosts and dinner guests to explore death through a specific Jewish lens. There were 154 dinners held with 1,290 participants. The new grant will allow Reboot to focus on growing and expanding Death Over Dinner to the greater Los Angeles community.
Following the launch of a redesigned website and pilot program in Los Angeles, people have engaged in new conversations around the dinner table.
“Death Over Dinner was a wonderful experience to make new friends and dig into conversations that are sometimes challenging but always important. The structure of the dinner made for a really comfortable and thought-provoking experience, and the discussion encouraged me to spend more time with these themes related to death in my own personal life.”
“Death over Dinner brought the topics of death and dying out of the shadows and into the light of Shabbat candles. It was a deeply humanizing experience: it’s hard not to feel a connection to people, even strangers, in a space of such intimate hopes, fears, and memories. I’d recommend the experience to anyone seeking a deeper, more conscious relationship with death — and, by extension, with life.”
In March, Reboot will embark on a partnership with OneTable, bringing Death Over Dinner to the Shabbat tables of young adults across the city. Additionally, Reboot will be working to empower community leaders to bring Death Over Dinner programming to their organizations by hosting training dinners, where clergy and organizations will have the opportunity to experience the program and learn best practices for facilitating the conversation themselves. We can’t wait to work with you to share Death Over Dinner - Jewish Edition.
If you’re interested in learning more about participating with Death Over Dinner - Jewish Edition in the Los Angeles area, contact Madelyne Heyman, Los Angeles Program Coordinator, at madelyne@rebooters.net.