Rabbi Chana Leslie Glazer

Rabbi Chana Leslie Glazer is a pluralistic Jewish spiritual leader and educator of all ages. She came to Adat Reyim as our first female rabbi, in 2020 – in the early months of the pandemic. Rabbi Glazer carried the Congregation through these difficult years with great dedication, using a variety of spiritual tools and pastoral skills, ritual innovation and technological platforms. Even today, she continues to lead most Synagogue programs both in person and on zoom – the latter being critical to support congregants with disabilities, those who live in other states or others who still haven’t returned to in-person gatherings.

While at Adat Reyim, Rabbi Glazer has maintained a strong focus on membership recruitment and engagement, launching and supporting several initiatives and groups to meet members’ social, intellectual and spiritual needs. These include: Meditation Minyan, the Exploring Judaism Group, the Interfaith Families’ Group, Rabbi’s Torah Discussions and Senior Sundays. She helped revive First Friday Shabbat at the Preschool, in-person Ruach with the Religious School, and many creative holiday celebrations with our children and families. Her newest initiative in 2023, New-Format Fridays, has sparked excitement in creating and exploring new and diverse spiritual experiences on Friday nights.

She has also brought her keen commitment to Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging to our Congregation, and to the larger community. This includes welcoming and outreach to members of the LGBTQ community, offering strong support for Interfaith Families, introducing non-binary genders into the Religious School, and guiding the Congregation’s successful process to allow non-Jews to serve on the Synagogue Board. She helped relaunch and expand our area’s interfaith clergy group. The Rabbi also worked with our local Jewish Community Relations Council, school board members, parents and students to advocate for antisemitism response in schools, and for the inclusion of Jewish, Muslim and Hindu holidays in the schools’ academic calendars.

Rabbi Glazer is also deeply engaged in Jewish pluralism and inclusion, having worked, lived or studied with many denominations of Judaism - including the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, where she received her ordination, earning multiple honors and awards.

Rabbi Glazer served as the spiritual leader of Congregation Am Haskalah of the Lehigh Valley, PA (Reconstructionist); Beth Sholom Synagogue of Memphis, TN (Conservative); and Beth Israel Synagogue of Roanoke, VA (Traditional). She was the Chaplain for Jewish Community at Bucknell University in Lewisburg, PA, where she served as the campus rabbi, Hillel director and director of Jewish Life. She also spent a year as a student chaplain at the Abramson Center for Jewish Life of North Wales, PA, a senior living residence – which was invaluable experience in working with Jewish elders.

Prior to that, Rabbi Glazer spent more than a decade working as a journalist, foreign correspondent and editorial manager, most of which was served covering Latin America and the Caribbean. She graduated Magna Cum Laude from Cornell University with an interdisciplinary degree in Government, International Relations and Latin American Studies.

Rabbi Glazer speaks five languages and loves learning. She enjoys art and culture of many kinds, current events, travel, spiritual practices including prayer, yoga and meditation, as well as getting outdoors and playing with her rescue dog, Nina Mina.