Welcoming & Raising Children

Close-up of adult hands with rings holding a childs hand, symbolizing family and unity.

We greet each child with affection and joy. Every baby comes to us full of promise and potential. As parents, we are privileged to welcome them into our families, our communities, and the embrace of the Jewish people. Raising children to adulthood, we encounter many milestones along the way. Children are weaned, lose their teeth, and start school. Some get their driver’s licenses and eventually leave home for good. Here are rituals for welcoming children and for celebrating the milestones on their paths to adulthood.

Latest Rituals

Welcoming ceremony for a baby girl inspired by priestesses

newborn girl with headdress

A weaning ritual to allow child to transition to next phase of independence

woman helping toddler drink from cup

Learn the shehekhyanu prayer in American Sign Language, along with the Debbie Friedman melody

Two people standing indoors. One is signing in ASL, while the other looks at the camera. Abstract art in the background.

Learn the shehekheyanu prayer in American Sign Language

Two people standing indoors. One is signing in ASL, while the other looks at the camera. Abstract art in the background.

A poem for Rosh Hashanah and beginning of the school year on sending one’s child to school

A child crouches on a wooden log, touching the surface of a calm lake with stones visible underwater.

Teaching a child Torah for the first time

Adult and child holding hands, walking on a sunlit street. The child wears a red coat and a beanie.

Ceremony of redemption of the first-born child

newborn baby with dark hair

A welcoming and naming ceremony for a new baby

A couple lovingly gazes at a newborn baby lying on a bed, wrapped in a white blanket.

A mother’s prayer for her child

mother and baby

Welcoming a child into a new family

mother lifting baby in the air in a field

The Reconstructionist Network

Serving as central organization of the Reconstructionist movement

Training the next generation of groundbreaking rabbis

Modeling respectful conversations on pressing Jewish issues

Curating original, Jewish rituals, and convening Jewish creatives

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The Reconstructionist Network