New to this blogging enterprise and tentative about it, I am nevertheless pleased to be able to ¨converse¨ about two topics that have dominated my professional and my personal life: law and religion.

These are great to study, talk about and change together. Yet each person comes at them from a particular vantage point and experience, knowing them in a way that is necessarily unique.  Because of this perspectival thing, I´d like to use this first blog posting to tell folks my perspective. I tend to view life with two major lenses: the law and as a church person who has studied religion academically.

First, I am not a “professor of religion and constitutional law”, as I´ve been introduced! I have a less exalted status — a senior lecturer-in-law at Washington University Law. I have taught courses in U.S. constitutional law and in the first amendment and religion. But now I mostly teach…

I have been eager to share a little bit about what my teen Rosh Hodesh groups are about. After all, it was through my participation in these groups that ultimately led to me being part of this blog. So I’ll start with a little background…

Rosh Hodesh literally means “the head of the month”. The Jewish calendar is based on the lunar cycle and Rosh Hodesh marks each month’s new moon.

Most people have probably heard of Rosh Hashanah which is known as the Jewish new year (”head of the year”). The Talmud teaches that Rosh Hodesh was given to women because they refused to be involved in the creation of an idol and did not surrender their jewelry to make the golden calf.

So, I am lucky enough to be a part of a national program called “Rosh Hodesh: It’s a Girl Thing!”. The goal of this group experience is to strengthen adolescent…