In the warm Israeli/American/Canadian/Polish documentary “Chasing Portraits,” filmmaker Elizabeth Rynecki, the great-granddaughter of Jewish-Polish artist Moshe Rynecki, searches for his lost paintings that vanished at the end of the war. Moshe Rynecki...

In 1943, a Nazi SS officer approaches a Swedish diplomat on an overnight train between Warsaw and Berlin, and tells him, tearfully and in awful detail, about the mass murders being carried out in Nazi concentration camps. The SS officer shows the diplomat...

For many, autumn in St. Louis is a favorite time of year. The hot temperatures of summer give way to cooler days. The leaves of trees take on — in good years — beautiful red and yellow hues. Thanksgiving and Hanukkah aren’t too far off. For readers...

I hadn’t intended to write a column this week. The hate-filled attack at a Pittsburgh synagogue Saturday morning that left 11 dead and six injured enraged me to where I could hardly speak, let alone write. Then Susan Kutner showed up on my doorstep.Kutner...

Paul Schankman, a local filmmaker, produced a documentary for HEC Media about the building swap between Kol Rinah, a Conservative Jewish congregation, and The Journey, a Christian church. The  name of the film is "A Moving Story.""What started as a simple...

Acoustic guitar music fills the auditorium at Congregation Shaare Emeth, where ambient blue light helps set a festive mood. A gaggle of guys wearing bright yellow T-shirts, bedecked with the words “Cook,” “Eat,” “Kibitz,” and “Repeat”...

Taylor Lynn Edwards, daughter of Stacy and Bill Parks of Joliet, Ill., and Joseph Cole Harper, son of Cindy and Scott Harper of Chesterfield, have announced their engagement.Taylor is the granddaughter of Pamela and Henry Edwards of Minooka, Ill. Cole...

Jeannine Millner and Dr. Steven Brown have announced their engagement. Jeannine recently retired as the Foodservice Director at Crown Center for Senior Living. She is currently a full-time religious studies major at Fontbonne University.Steven received...

October is upon us. I know because my Instagram feed is full of decorative gourds and pumpkin spice lattes.But as much as Americans truly love pumpkin, we are sometimes guilty of typecasting this nutritious vegetable as sweet and forget that pumpkin has...

Once again Howard Schwartz has retained the title of the Jewish Literary Zondek, or “Godfather” of St. Louis, bringing forth his latest book “A Palace of Pearls: The Stories of Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav” (Oxford University Press, $34.95, cloth).Schwartz,...

Rabbi James Stone Goodman came to town soon after graduation from Hebrew Union College. “I was ordained in 1981,” said Goodman, 69, a Detroit native. “This was my first stop.”It has been a long one. Beginning at Congregation Shaare Emeth and...

To the rescueAfter exiting his plane in the Newark, N.J. airport on Monday, Gavriel “Gavy” Friedson spotted a situation all too familiar to him. An elderly Orthodox Jewish woman in a wheelchair was turning blue in the face as she and her family approached...