5/2/2009
Three Women’s Division Landmark Events
The Mesila Women’s Division held three landmark events yesterday, in the cities of Kiryat Sefer, Jerusalem, and Bnei Brak.
The Kiryat Sefer event was a prelude to the Women’s Division’s new Event Counseling Program, in which specially trained counselors will help families marrying off children to build and stick to realistic wedding budgets. Rabbi Meir Kessler, rav of Kiryat Sefer, emphasized the importance of responsible financial management, particularly with regard to making weddings, noting that we can only expect to receive Hashem’s assistance if we carry out our own obligations responsibly. Rabbi Natan Rosen, senior lecturer at Arachim, followed with practical advice for negotiations between mechutanim. Mesila Family Division Director Zvi Silver then talked about how to build a wedding budget, and Shimon Milgrom of Bank Pagi outlined the pros and cons of mortgages vs. gemach loans.
In Jerusalem, the Belz community held a convention attended by approximately 500 of its seminary students from across Israel, for the purpose of presenting its new wedding spending regulations. At the convention, Mesila’s Yael Zalts and comedienne Ronia Cohen gave a fascinating – and often hilarious – presentation about weddings and money management. The underlying message of the presentation was that the joy of a wedding is not related to the amount of money spent, and the enthusiastic response of the girls indicated that the presentation was a tremendous success.
In Bnei Brak, the Women’s Division, in partnership with the local municipality, launched a new workshop series entitled “Parenting and Money.” This workshop series is one of ten concurrent series that the Women’s Division is orchestrating across the country, in the cities of Ashdod, Beit Shemesh, Haifa, Jerusalem, and Kiryat Sefer.
In addition to these Women’s Division events, Mesila’s new Baltimore branch held a community gathering yesterday entitled “Improving your Marriage Through Financial Stability.” To round out the busy day’s roster of events, monthly board meetings were held in Mesila’s Jerusalem headquarters and Lakewood branch.