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Welcome to Ozreinu! Ozreinu – Hebrew for “Our Help” – is a world of blessings, of challenges and of courageous, loving parents. Ozreinu is a place for study and for sharing.
Ozreinu is a Torah study/spiritual support group for parents of children with special needs.
Ozreinu provides a spiritual, Jewish form of support for parents of special needs children. Ozreinu gives parents a place in the larger Jewish community, and uses Jewish texts as a central basis for support. Ozreinu participants come from all the major Jewish denominations, and our groups meet monthly. At our meetings, we offer each other inclusion, connection, support and spiritual sustenance.
At Ozreinu meetings, we build our spiritual community by studying and by sharing. We start with text study – selections might be from Torah, the prayer book, Talmud, Hasidic literature, the Hagaddah, or even Israeli poetry. Then, we connect the text to the challenges of special-needs children and to us, their parents. Following the text study, we share a brief, personal "check-in", almost always focused on a recent success. At every monthly meeting, we strengthen our sense of being part of a caring community; and acknowledging blessings despite the hardships – no matter how challenging things get.
Ozreinu has created a space in which Torah can reach special needs parents, speak to our challenges, give us strength and surround us with community. More than anything, Ozreinu is a powerful, strong weapon in the fight against the loneliness and despair that comes with this territory. The formula is simple: Torah study brings God’s presence – and with it, community, support, warmth – and a better life. Through Ozreinu many of us have learned to see not curse but blessing; to feel not isolation but companionship. Talmud Torah k’neged kulam – the study of Torah is our foundation.
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