An unsung hero, a North star, the nucleus of a family, a chaplain of Jewish Cleveland, a community connector, an advocate and, most importantly, a friend. These are the words that community leaders used to remember longtime Cleveland area Rabbi Rosette Barron Haim.<\/p>\n
Reverently known as \u201cRabbi Rosie,\u201d Haim died on May 6 in Cleveland at 64 years old, following a 2024 diagnosis of breast cancer, which she battled until the end. Those who knew Haim all agreed \u2013 her love of Judaism and her support for Israel were at the core of everything that she did, and everything that she loved.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a cornerstone of her life and our family life as well, not only from a religious perspective, but also from a cultural perspective,\u201d Adam Seltzer, Haim\u2019s son-in-law, told the Cleveland Jewish News.<\/p>\n
One of the longest-serving congregational rabbis in Greater Cleveland, Haim was ordained at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati in 1988 and was a fixture at the former The Temple-Tifereth Israel in Beachwood from 1988 to 2018, becoming an associate rabbi in 1991.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are a few things that she loved, and it was Judaism, it was Israel, and it was her family and friends,\u201d Seltzer said. \u201cThat was what her life was all about, and she loved all of them equally.\u201d<\/p>\n
Born on Oct. 19, 1961 in Galesburg, Ill., Haim was a resident of Beachwood with her husband, Marshall Barron, and became known throughout the Greater Cleveland community for her extensive involvement in Jewish causes, services and celebrations.<\/p>\n
Haim became the first woman to chair Israel Bonds\u2019 National Rabbinic Advisory Council in 2022 and, most recently, served as chair of the Cleveland Campaign Advisory Council. Thomas Lockshin, executive director for Israel Bonds in Ohio and Kentucky, said that he was incredibly lucky to have her support and work by her side.<\/p>\n
\u201cRabbi Rosie was not just my Cleveland general chair, Marshall and Rosie were our friends,\u201d Lockshin told the CJN. \u201cRabbi Rosie chose to devote much of her time and energy to the Israel Bonds mission to strengthen every aspect of Israel\u2019s economy, while also connecting countless Jewish families to Israel, and increased participation in the Israel Bonds campaign. Her passing was a shock and a tragedy of gigantic proportions but she would want us to continue her legacy.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to Lockshin, her daughter, Shira, now chairs the Cleveland New Leadership Advisory Council, with a goal of connecting young adults to Israel Bonds, from generation to generation.<\/p>\n
Continuing to serve the local community, Haim was a chaplain for the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, a program supported by its annual Campaign for Jewish Needs, that comforts members of the Jewish community in hospitals, nursing homes, the military and prisons through correspondence and visits.<\/p>\n
\u201cRabbi Rosie was a beloved leader, whose compassion, warmth and dedication touched countless lives throughout our community,\u201d Erika B. Rudin-Luria, president of the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, told the CJN. \u201cAs a chaplain for the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, she brought comfort, connection and spiritual care to community members during some of life\u2019s most difficult moments. Her enduring commitment to Jewish life and to caring for others leaves a lasting legacy. My thoughts are with her husband Marshall, daughter Shira, and her entire family at this time. May her memory be a blessing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Haim served as an auxiliary rabbi at Park Synagogue since 2020. Rabbi Joshua Skoff told the CJN that although her role at the synagogue was part time, she devoted so much of her time to bettering the congregation.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe always found the best way to help the congregation,\u201d Skoff said. \u201cShe gave great advice, she gave great guidance \u2013 not only because that was her role, but because that was the nature of her talent. What she brought to bear was a great eye for important dynamics of a synagogue. She was very helpful to me personally, and to the congregation.\u201d<\/p>\n
From her impassioned talks on the bimah to her love for Purim and Jewish holidays, Skoff said that when Haim said she wanted to help the synagogue, she really meant it. According to him, she was \u201cnot there for the kudos.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn her role in the community for many years, she was an unsung hero,\u201d Skoff said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn addition to that, she handled her illness with great dignity and poise. For many, they weren\u2019t aware that she was struggling and succumbing to her illness.\u201d<\/p>\n
Skoff said that he will always remember the last talk that Haim gave on the seventh day of Passover on April 8 \u2013 exactly one month before her funeral on May 8.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was struggling on April 8, but I\u2019m not sure that anybody knew it,\u201d he said. \u201cShe still gave a wonderful talk \u2013 really one of her best talks at Park Synagogue that I had heard.\u201d<\/p>\n
Throughout the community, Haim was a member of multiple boards, including the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, the Jewish Education Center of Cleveland and the Cleveland Jewish Publication Company Board of Directors, which she joined in 2011. There, she served as the vice chair of the governance committee, and previously as director and secretary.<\/p>\n
Kevin S. Adelstein, president of the Cleveland Jewish Publication Company and publisher and CEO of the CJN, said that Haim believed in the importance of a consistent, independent Jewish media outlet. Since beginning his tenure at the CJPC in 2013, Adelstein described Haim as his \u201cNorth star.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI often went to her for guidance on all things related to Judaism,\u201d Adelstein said. \u201cShe actually gave us the name \u2018Cleveland Jewish News 12 Under 36: Members of the Tribe.\u2019 She named them for the 12 tribes of Israel. She was everything to me as a lay leader and even more as a dear and cherished friend.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite an annual heckling of one another over their longstanding football rivalry \u2013 Haim a Michigan fan and Adelstein a Buckeye \u2013 Adelstein said that it was impossible to not feel the warmth of her presence. She was never going to sit in a room and \u201cjust be wallpaper,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen she walked into a room, she always had a smile on her face,\u201d Adelstein said. \u201cShe always had a story to tell. There\u2019s not one meeting that I sat in on with her, and I know this definitively, where she didn\u2019t contribute to that meeting. She had such a presence. The beauty of her, both inside and out, was so apparent, and she always had something constructive to contribute to each meeting.\u201d<\/p>\n
Adelstein said that community members often looked to Haim for matters of Jewish importance, seeking the maternal nature that she exuded with her soft, but strong, presence. Jewish traditions were of the utmost importance to her.<\/p>\n
In 2018, Haim founded Celebrating Jewish Life, which she ran alongside musician and friend, Chuck Fink, who told the CJN that Celebrating Jewish Life was Haim\u2019s brainchild \u2013 one that allowed her to share her joy of Jewish holidays and traditions with the community.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe wanted to bring people together to share the love that she felt for the holidays and for our Jewish traditions with people that she cared about, which really was anyone that was in her presence,\u201d Fink said. \u201cShe provided a welcoming atmosphere wherever we were celebrating Jewish life, because wherever we were, it became our sacred space, our sanctuary of sorts. The connector of all of that was Rosie.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fink, who called it an honor and a privilege to work alongside Haim, added that, of the many songs that were incorporated into their services, one that has been recurring in his head in the last week is \u201cYeish Kochavim (There are Stars).\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe words say, \u2018There are stars up above, so far away we only see their light long after the star itself is gone. And so it is, with people that we loved, their memories keep shining ever brightly, though their time with us is done,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cNow, when I sing that song, I\u2019ll think of Rosie and count her among the stars that continue to shine down on us, and one of the blessings in my life. My heart breaks to see her go, yet I\u2019m so grateful that she lived and mattered, and that I knew her and got to work and learn alongside her all these years. I\u2019ll miss her greatly, and I know I\u2019m not alone.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to Fink, Celebrating Jewish Life gave Haim the freedom to do what she wanted, how she wanted to do it. With that freedom, she spread joy, love and grace throughout the community for many years.<\/p>\n
On May 1, Haim updated her Celebrating Jewish Life family in an email, just five days before her passing, and offered one last wish for the Cleveland Jewish community \u2013 a community that wrapped their arms around her in the end, the same way that she did for them for over 30 years.<\/p>\n
\u201cMay you continue to be a source of light to one another,\u201d she wrote, \u201cand may you go from strength to strength, from blessing to blessing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Haim is survived by her husband, Marshall Barron, and their daughter, Shira (Adam) Seltzer, grandchildren Ava and Ethan Seltzer, and her mother-in-law, Norma Barron. She was the sister of Joe (Debbie) Haim and Ronald (Susan) Haim. She was preceded in death by her parents, Fani and David Haim, and her father-in-law, Irv Barron.<\/p>\n
Services were held on May 8 at Park Synagogue in Pepper Pike. Interment followed at Mount Olive Cemetery in Solon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An unsung hero, a North star, the nucleus of a family, a chaplain of Jewish Cleveland, a community…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":114517,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[39572,28570,37,39573,28569,16151,499,39569,3136,39570,39571,463],"class_list":{"0":"post-114516","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israel","8":"tag-cleveland","9":"tag-ethnoreligious-groups","10":"tag-israel","11":"tag-jewish-belief-and-doctrine","12":"tag-jewish-groups","13":"tag-jews-and-judaism","14":"tag-judaism","15":"tag-park-synagogue","16":"tag-rabbi","17":"tag-rabbi-rosette-barron-haim","18":"tag-rabbi-rosie","19":"tag-religion"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116575835420873718","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114516","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114516"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114516\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114517"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}