Edwards, CO - When visiting the new Chabad Center of the Vail Valley, Jews of all backgrounds can expect Rabbi Dovid Mintz and his wife, Doba, to welcome them with warmth and kosher treats.
Chabad Center adds dimension to Jewish community
Edwards, CO – When visiting the new Chabad Center of the Vail Valley, Jews of all backgrounds can expect Rabbi Dovid Mintz and his wife, Doba, to welcome them with warmth and kosher treats.
The Mintzes want to emphasize the inclusiveness of their resource center, which they run out of their home in Edwards. Valley residents are welcome, as are second-home owners. Tourists just visiting can also stop by their home. No one is considered a “member.” There is no signing up, nor is there any fee.
“Everybody’s accepted here,” Mintz said. “We’re one big, happy family.”
“Chabad” is a Hebrew word that means wisdom, understanding and knowledge, Doba Mintz said. Those who come to the center are striving to become better at these three and connect them to their lives. There are 300,000 such centers worldwide.
The young rabbi and his wife, both in their early to mid-20s, have only been in the valley for about two months, but have already attracted a considerable number of Jews mainly through their Web site, but also through word-of-mouth.
“We have been met with unbelievable success,” Mintz said. “I underestimated the amount of Jews in the area …. Every few days, or every few hours, I’m meeting somebody else.”
The rabbi, who grew up in Brooklyn along with his wife, said he would often come to Aspen to visit his brother, also a rabbi, who opened a chabad center six years ago from scratch. Mintz’s brother later raised a little more than $20 million to build a center, which Mintz calls an “unbelievable success story.” The Mintzes hope to one day do the same.
A Variety of Programs
The couple provides kosher food for tourists; perform kadesh, a prayer on the anniversary on someone’s passing, done in groups of 10; serve Friday night Shabbat dinners at their home; visit hospital patients; put up mezuzahs, or holy prayers, on people’s doorposts; as well as offer educational programs. Doba has taken on this last as her task, since her specialty at her Jewish high school was in special education.
The two are working to bring a survivor of the 1972 Munich Olympics attack to Vail to speak. They are also promoting a National Jewish Retreat in mid-August at Copper Mountain Resort, where Jewish scholars will come to speak.
Although they have not already done so in the valley, the rabbi expects to help Jewish families arrange circumcision and officiate over weddings and bat mitzvahs, among other services.
“You name it, we provide it,” Mintz said.
A Personal Decision
Mintz and his wife may follow a more traditional path of Judaism, but they are quick to say that this is their own personal decision, and it does not matter the form of Judaism each person practices. “Labels are for shirts and shoes, not for people,” Mintz said.
“A lot of the Jewish people out here or organizations … they look at each other as God’s policemen,” he said. “We look at each other as God’s salesmen, to bring the beauty of the Torah, of the Bible, of Judaism with love to every individual.”
The Mintzes base their teachings off of Chassidism, which stresses unity among all Jews instead of differentiating between synagogues and schools of thought.
Mintz pursued rabbinical studies in Budapest, while Doba taught in Hebrew School in New York and at Chabad Jewish camps in Thailand, Denmark, Panama, Canada and California.
On Tuesday, the rabbi collaborated with the local Jewish congregation, B’Nai Vail, for the Lag BaOmer celebration, the anniversary of the passing of the founder of Kabbalah, or Jewish mysticism. About 70 people attended the celebration, held at Nottingham Lake. The Mintzes shipped dozens of kosher deli sandwiches from Brooklyn for the occasion.
Another Dimension
On June 2, the Mintzes will hold an event for Shavuot, the celebration of the giving of the Torah, when they will read the Ten Commandments and re-live the experience.
Many of the people who have come to the couple’s events also attend B’Nai Vail services, like Sheila Gouterman, who has lived in Edwards for about four years. Gouterman said the center adds another dimension to the Jewish experience in the valley.
“Together with B’nai Vail, it really does provide an expanded learning experience,” Gouterman said.
B’Nai Vail, part of the Vail Interfaith Chapel, has been around for about 30 years and counts 200 families in its congregation. C.J. Tenner, co-president of B’Nai Vail, said he expects the two organizations to complement each other.
The Mintzes are very happy to be the chabad representatives in Vail, they said.
“How many people get an option to be a rabbi out in an area like this?” Mintz said.
cringing
why dont the older smarter Shluchim train the pups how to present themselves ?
rochi shemtov
Such incredible accomplishments in such a short time. Continued Hatzlocha in your important work for our Rebb, zy"a.
Akiva
Wow, 300,000 Chabad centers world wide? Being each center has a couple, and most couples have children, that makes about 1,500,000 Chabad chassidim in the world, or in other words, 1 in every 10 Jews in the world is a Chabad chossid.
Or, maybe not. Maybe it should be 3,000 Chabad centers at most. Anyone know the current real number as published by the shulchim’s office? Maybe it’s 3,000 Chabad institutions (you know, count the Chabad house, the camp, the mikvah, the day school, and then your Chabad house is 4 institutions).
one of the MANY of estys freinds:)
great work!!
Costomer
Hatzlocha, may you make many sales.
your old clasmates ;)
hatzlacah Dovid! from all the kinderlach here in Pre 1 A beis!
wohw
There are 300,000 such centers worldwide.
wow??????????
Terri - Budapest
I miss you!
Mazal Tov!
one of shainys billions of friends
great job
mazel
why is the picture taken crooked
mm
Who do you thing you are?? are you a shliach?? who are you to call a young shliach who undertakes a HUGE mission inl life to go on shlichus, for life, a pump?? why dont you try moving to some small town somewhere, where the word “jew” often has to be explained…and then maybe you’ll think before you talk next time.
to mm
the fact is that the older shluchim are more expirienced. this youngees seem a bit clueless and also dont represent proffesionalism. therefore commenter #1 is suggesting that before sounding silly, they revue it with an older shliach.
300,000
ha. a typical example of cluelessness
A Schliach
Professionalism, you can’t even structure a sentence properly, never mind the spelling.
What you wrote:
*the fact is that the older shluchim are more *expirienced. *this* *youngees* seem a bit clueless and also *dont represent *proffesionalism. *therefore commenter #1 is suggesting that before sounding silly, they *revue it with an older shliach.
What you should have written:
The fact is that the older shluchim are more experienced. These young shluchim seem a bit clueless and also don’t represent professionalism. Therefore commenter #1 is suggesting that before sounding silly, they review it with an older shliach.
Actually idiots shouldn’t write anything!
a thought
I think you should have at least a high school deploma before going on shlichus. at least GED……….
Itzik_s
Are we now on such an exalted level that we can tear the Rebbe’s shluchim apart?
As for the crooked picture, it is a modern style of some sort – not sure if it is Photoshopped or done by positioning the camera. Not my style, but again, it is great that we are getting such positive coverage in a place like Vail.
oneof dobas cousins
it happens to be that these two lovely ppl are devoted chassidim and shluchim of the rebbe i know this because they are my cousins and they have not a stitch of geyvah in them they left on shlichus to spread yiddishkeit just like the rest of my family. and about the degree what does that have to do with anything? but jftr by cousin has more then a GED. we are talking about shluchim that have devoted their lives to the rebbe dont post nonsense
To:a thought
I think you should learn to capitalize the first word of a sentence before making statements on a public forum.
By the way it’s “diploma” not “deploma”.
What a bunch of jealous miserable Crown Heightsers. Why don’t you try to get a job?
Ariel Badatznick
menachem
The grate thing about dovid mintz and his friends who I happen to know personally is they don’t get affected by people who try to disturb the rebbe’s shluchim they will just continue doing the REBBE’S work.
future shliach
I learnt already in life that when ever someone has something negative to say its because he or she is just simply jeolous!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!