“Rituals and traditional songs give us a way of accessing memories we might not get to otherwise,” says Pastor Stephen Weisser, of Paul’s Run Community in Philadelphia. “A song or a liturgical fragment that is known will cause people to go to places [in the past] and start conversations. Even for residents with high levels of dementia, it’s a road back, a window back, into their community. And for everyone, it’s deeply important to keep doing the worship that we grew up with, that we know.” Read more…

On Friday nights, recreational therapist Kenneth Tirado used to bless the candles and, when she could find one, she read a story on a Jewish theme. But the brief observance left some of the dozen or so Jewish residents at her workplace, an 84-bed, long-term care facility, unsatisfied. One elderly woman continued to press her for more stories long after Tirado’s supply ran out. When Tirado and her colleagues introduced the Sacred Seasons Oneg Shabbat celebration on Friday evenings, the problem was solved. Read more ...

“If a visitor is coming from a home where people are getting ready for Shabbat, and comes into a place where a parent or relative is doing the same, there’s a sense that we’re part of the same world together still,” says Rabbi Sara Paasche-Orlow, of Hebrew SeniorLife in Boston. “ Part of what people sometimes find off-putting about long-term-care life is that you walk in, and it’s an island, disconnected; it’s not in sync. The Oneg Shabbat celebration puts us in sync.” Read more…