RABBI DANIEL S. BRENNER
Rabbi Daniel S. Brenner is the director of the Center for
Multifaith Education at Auburn Theological Seminary.
After studying religion at King's College- London and
earning a B.A. in philosophy at the University of
Wisconsin, Brenner received both his M.A. and rabbinic
ordination from the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College
in 1997.
Brenner went on to study with noted theologian and holocaust scholar Rabbi Irving Greenberg at the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership, where he served for five years as a senior teaching fellow and was named by The Jewish Week as one of the upcoming generation's "best and brightest" Jewish leaders in 2001. A published playwright and a frequent essayist, the book Brenner co-authored (with help from Joseph J. Fins, M.D., Chief of Medical Ethics at Cornell's New York-Presbyterian Medical Center and Rabbi Tsvi Blanchard) Embracing Life and Facing Death: A Jewish Guide to Palliative Care, was praised by Senator Joseph Lieberman as a "transcendent contribution." Brenner is a popular public speaker and has been a contributor to Crosscurrents, The Infinite Mind, Killing the Buddha, Beliefnet, The Jewish Week, The Living Pulpit, Spirituality & Health and The Forward. In 2004, he received a Simon Rockower Award for Excellence in Jewish Journalism and his fifth professionally produced play - Driving School of America - premiered at New York City's Vital Theater.
In his capacity as director of the Center for Multifaith Education, Brenner has participated and presented his work at the First World Congress of Imams and Rabbis for Peace at Egmonts Palace in Brussels, the Parliament of the World's Religions in Barcelona, the Conference on Religious Dialogue in Doha, the Inter-religious Coordinating Council of Israel in Jerusalem and has hosted groups from Belarus, Iceland, Japan, Israel, Jordan, Egypt, Russia, and many parts of the United States.
In addition to serving as the director, Brenner serves as a mentor for students from the William Davidson Graduate School of Education of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, Union Theological Seminary and Columbia University- Teacher's College. He is entering his seventh year as the spiritual leader of String of Pearls, Princeton's reconstructionist congregation, and his third year on the board of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association. Daniel lives with his wife Lisa and their three children in Montclair, New Jersey.
Selected Publications:
Sons of Isaac and Ishmael as One - The Jewish Week
Learning from Suffering - excerpt from Embracing Life and Facing Death
featured on Beliefnet
Teaching Talmud in Sing Sing - The Jewish Week
Under God - Spirituality and Health
The Right Way to Remember 9/11 - The Forward
(Also featured in Religious Diversity News, Harvard University -Pluralism Project)
Genesis of War - from The Ethics and Morality of War, published by the
Central Agency of Jewish Education
Helping the World's Poorest Billion People - The Jewish Week
For Rabbi Brenner's weekly commentary on UPI, please click the icon below:
Recieveing a khata from exiled Tibetan monk
Geshe L. Sopa.
Working with a group of public school students
and faculty from the Expeditionary Learning High
School in the Bronx in a program on religious
diveristy.
Joining Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf onstage at the
Knitting Factory for the 'Festival
Cordoba: Celebration of Muslim and Jewish
Music' event.
Meeting with a U.S. State Department delegation
of Palestinian citizens of Israel from the Mossawa
Center.
Dialoging in a program on economic disparity
with theater director Marty Pottenger.
Convenning a conference with religious studies
scholar Jonathan Z. Smith on "Sacred Space"
Hosting a U.S. State Department Bureau of
Cultural Affairs delegation of Muslims from Russia.
Participating in a conference with the Alzheimer's
Association on the role of religious communities in
responding to the disease.
Facillitating a program with Dr. Ron Kronish (left)
and Rev. James Loughran (right) on Jewish-
Christian relations and the documentary film
"I am Joseph, Your Brother."
Leading a song session at the
Face to Face/Faith to Faith
Youth Leadership Program.
Speaking in Jerusalem at the Interreligious
Coordinating Council of Israel with Face
to Face participant Zaki Djemal and
Ambassador Aharon Lopez.
Joining guest clergy for the 75th anniversary of
New York City's Riverside Church.
Thanking director Marc Rothemund, after a screening of his Academy Award
nominee for Best Foreign Film Sophie Scholl The Final Days.
Fielding questions for Cheif Rabbi
Sir Jonathan Sacks at the University Club
in Manhattan.
In Doha, Qatar with the American ambassador,
a London based Imam, and Rabbi Rolando Matalon.
Delivering the invocation at an immigrants
rights rally in Battery Park, across the water
from Ellis Island.
In Montreal with co-panelists at the McGill University sponsored conference "World's Religion after 9/11."
At a press conference in New York with Darfurian refugee Yahya Osman, Rev. Herb Daughtry,
Imam Talib, Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch and other religious leaders.
After the show Lemkin's House at Vital Theater in a panel on religious responses to genocide
with Rev. Chloe Breyer and Imam Talib.
In the Bronx with Nurah Amatullah Jeter, Executive Director of the
Muslim Women's Institue for Research and Development.
With Avi and Saleh, one Israeli and one Palestinian particpant from the Face to Face/Faith to Faith
program on their speaking tour of Manhattan.
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