Our Clergy

Rabbi K'vod Wieder

A native of Orange County, K’vod received his BA in psychology from UC Santa Cruz in 1993 and his MA in Transpersonal Psychology (counseling) from the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology in 1996. He received an MA in Jewish Studies from the American Jewish University and was ordained at the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies in 2012. He is a member of both the Central Conference for American Rabbis (Reform) and the Rabbinical Assembly (Conservative) For the last 26 years, K’vod has been teaching classes, leading retreats, and counseling students in meditation, prayer, and creative forms of Jewish spirituality in the United States. He has served as the assistant director of Chochmat HaLev – a Jewish meditation center in Berkeley, program director for Sonoma County Jewish Federation, director of the B’nai Tzedek Teen Philanthropy Program for the Harold Grinspoon Foundation, program director for Elat Chayyim Center of Jewish Spirituality, and trained and interned with Jewish Funds For Justice and One L.A in the area of congregation-based community organizing.  In 2001, K’vod created and implemented the first county-wide post-bnai mitzvah program in Sonoma County, and won the Etz Chayyim award for Informal Jewish education at the National Conference for Informal Jewish Education in 2005. K’vod joined Temple Beth El of South Orange County in 2011 to serve the synagogue’s vision of Progressive Judaism. In collaboration with staff and congregants, he has initiated some of TBESOC’s strongest initiatives, including the 8th Grade Tzedakah Board, Small Groups, Pathfinders, Can We Talk?! Building Relationships Through Disagreement,  and the Center for Meditation and Jewish Spirituality. He is husband to Ilana Rogel-Wieder and the father of Levi, Aiden, and Aviv.

Rabbi Krause served Temple Beth El of South Orange County since July 1984. Ordained at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR) in 1967, he spent his undergraduate years at the University of California, Los Angeles and did doctoral work at the University of Chicago and the University of California, Berkeley. He also was a recipient of the Daniel Jeremy Silver Fellowship to study at Harvard University. In 1992, he was awarded a Doctor of Divinity by the HUC-JIR. Rabbi Krause devoted much of his life to human rights issues. In the 1970s, he was active in the Save Soviet Jewry movement, which led to his journey to the FSU to visit and bring support to Jewish Refuseniks. In 1983, he created the Ad Hoc Rabbinic Committee to Rescue Ethiopian Jewry, which mounted a national petition campaign to influence the American government to take action to save this threatened Jewish community. Here in Orange County, Rabbi Krause was a leader in interfaith activity and the founder of the Religious Diversity Forum. He was also the founder of the Morasha Day School, which for many years met the needs of the Jewish community in South Orange County. Rabbi Krause served as president of the Orange County Board of Rabbis and the Pacific Association of Reform Rabbis. He also served on the Executive Board of the Central Conference of American Rabbis and chaired the CCAR Task Force on Rabbi/Cantor Relations. Rabbi Krause and his wife Sherri have two grown children.

In Memory of Rabbi Allen Krause
from our sister congregation in Ra’anana, Israel Rabbi Tamar Kolberg and all members of Kehilat Ra’anan (Ra’anana, Israel) send their heartfelt condolences to Sherri and the children, to Rabbi Peter Levi and the members of Temple Beth El. Rabbi Krause was a devoted friend of our congregation for many years and was one of the moving spirits behind the vision of building a permanent home for us. It is through his endeavors that the Samueli family funded this project and they have remained solid friends ever since. Rabbi Krause was a strong supporter of Israel even when he found reasons to be critical of its policies – this is the essence of true friendship: being able to uphold a solid relationship while also knowing that in every partnership different opinions can be discussed and evaluated. Loving Israel and believing in the idea of a Jewish homeland does not negate giving up dreams of peace, of working towards a more inclusive situation for all those who live in Israel and the Middle East. Above all Rabbi Krause was a true “mench” – a human being who touched so many of our lives with his deep understanding and a keen sense of the “other”. We will miss Rabbi Kraus’s physical presence when we celebrate the Tenth Anniversary of Beit Samueli this coming June, and yet his spirit, his love, and his compassion will certainly be with us all. May all of you find comfort in his life long activities; his love of family; of the members of his congregation; his devotion to so many great causes and especially his love of Am Yisrael and Judaism. We send our love to Sheri, Gavriela, Roger, and Stephen and all of our friends at Temple Beth El – May his memory be blessed! Rabbi Tamar Kolberg Kehilat Ra’anan, Israel