RIO DE JANEIRO — Latin America’s largest synagogue, the 2,000-family Congregacao Israelita Paulista in Brazil, inaugurates its first female rabbi.
Some 200 people attend the welcome ceremony for Rabbi Fernanda Tomchinsky-Galanternik held last week at the 80-year-old Sao Paulo temple, also known by the acronym CIP. Ordained in December in Argentina, the Brazilian-born psychologist and mother of one also will coordinate the synagogue’s teaching department.
“CIP began to tread a path that is possible only within Judaism and particularly within such a pluralist community. But it can only be done with the presence and the action of all. I look forward to working with everyone in many different ways,” the rabbi says.
Rabbi Fernanda, as she has been commonly called, is the third female rabbi to serve at a Brazilian synagogue. Rio’s Reform temple ARI was the pioneer, hiring Paraguayan Rabbi Sandra Kochmann in 2003. Brazilian-born Luciana Pajecki Lederman has been Conservative Comunidade Shalom’s rabbi in Sao Paulo since 2005.
— JTA
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