Rabbi Stiefel's Monthly Article

Current June 2026

Rabbi Sharon Stiefel

Ritualwell

One of my favorite websites is Ritualwell, an online collection of contemporary Jewish prayers, poems, ceremonies, and spiritual practices. 

Back when I was in rabbinical school in the 1980s, we had something called “The Creative Liturgy File.” In a large file cabinet, I could poke around and discover how others had crafted a baby naming, created a ritual for obtaining a driver’s license, or assembled a booklet for wedding guests. These were resources and rituals we often could not find anywhere else. According to Ritualwell’s history,

Beginning in the early 1990s, the Kolot Center for Jewish Women’s and Gender Studies at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College amassed a treasure trove of new Jewish rituals. Responding to the call for resources that speak to the experiences of women and LGBTQ people, the collection expanded with inclusive rituals, prayers, poems, ceremonies and songs for all lifecycle moments. The filing cabinet of folders and photocopies grew as demand increased over the years. In partnership with the Jewish feminist organization Ma’yan, in 2001 Ritualwell.org was created to house this growing collection.

Thank goodness for the website! Today, Ritualwell contains more than 2,300 rituals and resources. Imagine how many filing cabinets that would take!

When Mayim Rabim began holding Zoom services during the pandemic (later followed by hybrid gatherings) I began curating prayers and readings to share on the screen rather than relying on the limited selections available in our prayerbook Kol Haneshamah. One of my go-to sources has consistently been Ritualwell. Wherever we are in the Jewish year, I can almost always find meaningful material. There are prayers for Jewish and secular holidays, reflections connected to the weekly Torah portion, new perspectives on prayers in our services, and meditations for times of uncertainty.

The website includes sections such as Israel Today, Lifecycles, Healing and Hard Times, Everyday Holiness, Holidays, and Shabbat. Within each are dozens of categories. Under Lifecycles alone, there are resources for growing older, gender and sexual identity, sanctifying and ending relationships, adoption, and retirement. Throughout the site there are blessings for beginning therapy, prayers for democracy, meditations for difficult news cycles, and rituals honoring gender transition and identity.

Ritualwell helps answer an important contemporary Jewish question: How do we mark milestones and experiences our ancestors never imagined?

What I appreciate most is that these new rituals are not disconnected from tradition. Many draw deeply from Jewish texts, symbols, and practices that support the Judaism of our time, keeping it responsive to the realities of contemporary life.

As summer begins, I invite you to spend a little time exploring Ritualwell (https://ritualwell.org/). You may discover a blessing you didn’t know you needed, words for an experience you have struggled to name, or inspiration to create rituals of your own. Perhaps that is the most important lesson of all: Judaism is not only given to us. It is also something we continue to create together.