26 | MARCH 16 • 2023 

W

hen 15-year-old 
Frankel Jewish 
Academy student 
Rena Kantor noticed a Keshet 
sticker on her parents’ door that 
said “LGBTQ Safe Space,
” she 
became curious about the orga-
nization.
Keshet, a Jewish initiative 
that aims to build equality for 
LGBTQ Jews, had a variety of 
programming for queer youth 
that Kantor quickly developed 
an interest in.
In 2020, she attended her first 
online Keshet youth event for 
LGBTQ teens and was immedi-
ately drawn to the empowering 
community that Keshet had 
created nationwide.
“I made a lot of friends 
throughout the years that I’ve 
been at Keshet,
” explains Kantor, 
a West Bloomfield resident. 
She calls last year’s Shabbaton 
retreat, which she helped plan as 

a teen representative of Keshet, 
a successful and moving event.
“It was one of the most 
incredible weekends,
” Kantor 
says. “There were a lot of activ-
ities that we planned to get to 
know each other.
” 

PLANNING EVENTS
Last year’s Midwest Shabbaton 
retreat, which took place 
in March 2022, saw mostly 
Midwest LGBTQ teens and 
allies attend, but also teens 
from as far away as California 
and Canada. Each year offers 
two Shabbaton retreats: one 
Midwest and one East Coast. In 
total, nearly 70 teenagers from 
around the country attended 
last year.
This year, the East Coast 
Shabbaton took place March 
10-12 in the D.C. area and is 
returning for its 11th annual 
event. The Midwest Shabbaton, 

meanwhile, will take place April 
28-30 in the Chicago area for its 
third year running.
The Midwest Shabbaton is 
still open to participants.
Kantor, along with other teen 
representatives from around the 
country who support the Keshet 
mission, is planning both 
Shabbaton retreats. Earlier this 
summer, she was asked to lead 
the program with a friend from 
New Jersey, who is also active in 
Keshet.
In addition to planning the 
Shabbaton retreats, Kantor 
also leads a Monday virtual 
event called Monday Evening 
Hangouts where LGBTQ teens 
ages 14-18 can play games 
online and get to know other 
teens within the community.
“We have really fun discus-
sions,
” she says. “It’s awesome to 
be able to talk to other people 
who might be going through 
the same thing as you.
”
The Shabbaton retreats and 
Monday Night Hangouts are 
just two of the many offerings 
that Keshet provides to its teen 
LGBTQ community. It includes 
gathering and learning spaces 
designed specifically for trans 
and non-binary Jewish teens, 
live shows, informative sessions 
about legislation that could 
affect LGBTQ rights and arts 
circles.
While the Keshet national 
office is in Boston, it also has 
offices in New York, the Bay 
Area, Chicago and Florida that 
work with LGBTQ Jews within 
their regions.
The Keshet website also has 
a vast library of resources that 
explore gender identity, activism 
and allyship, coming out and 
articles on parenting within 
LGBTQ families.

INSPIRING OTHERS
Kantor’s parents, Rabbi Shalom 
Kantor of Congregation B’nai 
Moshe in West Bloomfield, 

and Shana Kantor, say they’re 
proud of their daughter for her 
involvement in Keshet and her 
tireless work in empowering 
LGBTQ Jewish teens nation-
wide.
“It’s given her a safe space to 
explore her identity, both her 
Jewish identity and her LGBTQ 
identity, and what that means to 
her,
” Shana Kantor, 47, says. “It’s 
given her an opportunity to be a 
leader in ways where she gets to 
explore and bring together all of 
these pieces of herself and be a 
leader in really authentic ways.
”
Rabbi Kantor, 47, says of 
Keshet’s teen representatives: 
“Everybody feels that they are 
a part of creating something 
together. I think that skill is 
fantastic and something that I 
wish more of our teenagers and 
young adults had the opportu-
nity to experience.
”
Building a safe and empow-
ering community for LGBTQ 
teens is just one cornerstone of 
Keshet’s work.
The organization also part-
ners with institutions nation-
wide, including here in Metro 
Detroit, to share best practices 
for inclusivity and provide 
information on how to best 
serve the LGBTQ community 
both now and in the future.
These skills that Rena has 
learned, Shana Kantor explains, 
provide tremendous value.
“She can not only explain 
her own identity but also can 
translate for other people what 
it means to be Jewish and 
LGBTQ,
” she says. “That’s a 
huge benefit.
” 

West Bloomfield teen leads other 
youth with the Keshet organization.

Empowering 
LGBTQ Youth

ASHLEY ZLATOPOLSKY CONTRIBUTING WRITER

OUR COMMUNITY

Rena Kantor, 
left, and a 
friend at 
the 2022 
Shabbaton 
retreat

