Ethan Gilan
T
hree years ago, the lawyer
with the soft smile and
gentle disposition was
playing basketball with
Adat Shalom's Rabbi Danny
Nevins, and he got an idea. Why
not, he suggested, offer a Shabbat
service that would be "casual, inter-
active, participatory, non-threaten-
ing, to get young adults back into
the synagogue."
Gilan, who had come back to
Detroit in 1993 after law school,
pointed out that Adat Shalom, a
Conservative congregation, wasn't
tailoring programs for the needs of
young adults.
"I felt the young adult commu-
nity, twenty- and thirty-somethings,
were really unclerserved program-
7/17
1998
100
matically," he said. "People my age
were not going to synagogue for
any reason, they weren't comfort-
able with it, couldn't relate to it, it
wasn't relevant to them," he contin-
ued, and "the synagogues seemed to
be somewhat comfortable with
waiting until these young adults
became young families to include
them."
With careful attention to the
details -- like choosing Friday
night over Saturday morning, due
to its popularity for socializing
among the younger set -- he and
Rabbi Nevins created the monthly
Young Adult Shabbat Service. It has
become a screaming success among
Detroit's Jewish young adults.
Between 30 and 75 young adults
gather at Adat Shalom on. Shabbat
eve once a month, wearing any-
thing from long dresses to jeans and
knitted kippot.
Gilan, who is 30, traces his com-
mitment and love of Judaism to his
parents -- his mother has taught
Hebrew for more than 40 years. He
balances a serious law career with
Israeli dancing (he has performed in
Windsor, Flint and other venues)
and laughter. Gilan tried out for
Second City when it opened and
was part of the Comedy Company
as an undergraduate at the
University of Michigan. In law
school at Vanderbilt, he co-founded
and built the Jewish Law Students
Association.
The Jewish community is going
to face a lot of tough issues in the
future," he said, pointing to the ris
ing cost of day school education
and a "growing gap between the
haves and have-nots, do and do-
hots. As a young adult, I'm very
sensitive to issues of money. I don't
want the Jewish community to
focus solely or primarily on the
money.
Instead, he'd like to see organiza-
tions focus on "time-raising get
people to donate time. I hate High
Holiday pledge drives, but I'd love
to see people pledge 100 hours of
Jewish community service."
Gilan, who will marry Project
STaR graduate Lisa Freiman next
month, has little to do with YASS
these days, but a committee of his
dedicated. peers has taken over.
The-y've even published a
"YASSiddur" to guide participants
through the service in English,
Hebrew and transliteration,
"I think the struggle is to really
keep it fresh, innovative," said
Gilan.. "That can only happen by
having new leaders step to the
front.
They're obviously doing some-
thing right. There's a Singles
Shabbat gathering that jumps from
shul to shill, and last year, the
Jewish Federation of Metropolitan
Detroit launched Rekindling
Shabbat, Its Young Adult Task
Force has partnered with YASS and
other groups to get young adults
involved. with Shabbat. Copying?
YASS, Gilan said modestly, was
"probably the stimulus for a lot of
similar programs throughout the
community." He paused, then
noted, "Imitation is the sincerest
form of flattery."
•
Stephanie Jacobson
tephanie Jacobson has dis-
pelled the notion that "out-
siders" have a tough time
breaking into Detroit's
tight-knit community.
The 31-year-old Chicago native
and her husband, David, together
created the young adult committee
of JARC (Jewish Association for
Residential Care), mostly out of the
love and respect she was raised to
have toward developmentally dis-
abled individuals, including her own c±,
brother.
"I think it's a very important
cause, from personal experience," she
said. "And David's mother is on the
board of JARC. So we were asked to
help them start getting the young
adults involved. Young adults had
really not been involved at that time.
"I do this because I think JARC is
a great cause, and I come from a spe-
cial events and marketing back-
ground, so a lot of this fits into what
I like to do. It's easy for me," said
Jacobson.
She says it is easy, but like many
of her peers, she maintains a non-
stop pace. With a friend, she runs a
small custom invitation and corpo-
rate gift packaging business called
Paper Rose. Before that, she worked
in public relations for seven years.
And she has two young daughters.
Jacobson's first goal was to bring
young adults to JARC's annual fall
fund-raiser. Five years ago, it was a
concert, and Jacobson succeeded in