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LOIS HARON

851.6989

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Studio in Harvard Row Mall
6441
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The

Machon ['Torah
recognizes a
young leader with
a passion for learning.

SPOT

LYNNE MEREDITH COHN

STAFF WRITER

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P.J. Cherrin: A thinking Jew.

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21728 W. Eleven Mile Rd.
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Southfield, MI 48076

Hours: Mon.-Sat. 10-5

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New Rochester Hills

352-8622 L r

Since
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651 5009

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MERCURY

LINCOLN

445-6000

I

nspired by a scene in the movie Mr.
Holland's Opus, P.J. Cherrin gave
each of the students in his "Navi-
gating Judaism" class at Congrega-
tion Shaarey Zedek a compass.
"Good teaching is about more than
A
just education," says the 23-year-old
West Bloomfield native. It's about giv-
ing kids direction.
Jewish education gets Cherrin fired
up. But he feels that all he has learned
thus far, in the six-or-so years since his
life took a turn toward a more Jewish-
ly observant lifestyle, is just the tip of
the iceberg.
Cherrin doesn't think he deserves an
award for anything — let alone for Jew-
ish education. Call it humble acceptance.
But the leaders of Machon L'Torah's
Jewish outreach network in Oak Park
think otherwise. At Machon's annual
dinner June 24, Cherrin will receive the
first Young Leadership Award, which
will be an annual accolade thereafter,
according to Machon's Rabbi Avraham
Jacobovitz.
"P.J. was chosen because he [has
been] active ... in getting Jewish stu-
dents involved, not only with Machon
but with Hillel in East Lansing and He-
brew University in Jerusalem," Rabbi
J says.
"Most recently he organized our
weekend in West Bloomfield, Shabbat
Across America. [He] put together a
committee, was the driving force behind
it. He really showed some unusual lead-
ership skills."
Asked why he thinks he's receiving
the accolade, Cherrin says, "Because
I've been able to identify that [Machon
is] a kosher source for Jewish education.
The best you can do is bring the horse
to the trough."

Cherrin, however, thinks that a de-
serving candidate for the award would
have been a friend of his. Joey Felsen,
he says, was one of the primary influ-
ences for turning Cherrin toward a
Torah-observant lifestyle. "I think that
a lot of people are climbing up their lad-
ders of life as fast as they can — so they
can get into the best graduate school,
get the best job, best promotion, and
once they get to the top, where they
wanted to be, they realize the ladder
was on the wrong building," says Cher-
rin.
Felsen is a practicing example of how
not to live like that. "He's a person I as-
pire to be like because he's tocho k'baro
(a person whose external persona re-
flects what is inside)."
Another man to whom he looks for
guidance is Richard Joel, leader of Hil-
lel International.
Cherrin jokes how some observant
Jews have pictures of their rebbes on
the wall, while he hangs pictures of
communal leaders like Joel.
And he slips quotes from Michael
Medved, Dennis Prager — thinkers,
writers, Jewish scholars — into every-
day dialogue.
"I think life in [one's] 20s has to be a
time for navigating the terrain, finding
out what the buildings are, which one
to lean the ladder against," he says.
Cherrin's Jewish identity "is a par-
adigm for who I am," he says. On the
outside, Cherrin appears to be just an-
other twentysomething. Except for the
knitted kippot or one of the funky hats
he always wears, he dresses in the ca-
sual attire of a law student. He hangs
out with friends, goes to movies, "dis-
cusses all the normal things."
But Cherrin quickly adds that he

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