Meet Sarah Wolfberg

Board member Sarah Wolfberg is on BHC’s ritual committee. She also began maintaining our yahrzeit data base when Eileen Regen, who’d shouldered that task, asked for her help computerizing it.

         Sarah Wolfberg was born in the Chicago area, but moved to Sandy Springs, Georgia as a child. She attended elementary school at Torah Day School of Atlanta. Neither of her parents had been raised in religious households, but as Sarah and her younger sister grew, the family became more traditionally observant, eventually identifying as Chabad (Lubavitch) Chassidim.

         As a young girl, Sarah developed a compelling interest in her religion. She attended a Lubavitch overnight camp every year and co-facilitated a Lubavitch day camp during high school. Sarah’s parents agreed to consider high school options out-of-state that would fulfill her religious drive while providing her with a sound education. They settled on a Bais Yaakov school in New York.

        At the turn of the last century, Orthodox women received little formal education, either secular or religious. The Bais Yaakov movement, which began in Poland after the first World War, was meant to remedy this. The founder’s hope was to keep girls from abandoning their ties to Judaism and empower them to have a greater voice in their homes and communities. The Bais Yaakov movement remains rooted in Ultra-Orthodox traditions. 

        Sarah acknowledges there was a bit of atypical rebellion in her desire to become so intensely religious, but she believes she benefited from the educational isolation from boys. “Girls could really ask questions and be heard.”

        Sarah attended an Ultra-Orthodox seminary in Jerusalem for her first two years of college. Following this, she went to the Hebrew Theological College in Chicago to complete her BA, majoring in Psychology, Bible, and Judaic Studies. Initially, she considered becoming an educator and briefly taught at a Jewish nursery school in Chicago. She learned from this experience that she was especially interested in working one-on-one with children. She returned to school for her Psy.D. in Clinical Psychology from the Illinois School of Professional Psychology.

        Sarah came to Littleton as part of the National Health Services Corps, a government program that repays student loans for health care providers who relocate to rural and underserved communities. Since 2016, she has worked as a clinical psychologist at the Center For New Beginnings in Littleton, NH, a non-profit outpatient mental health clinic.

        When her first High Holidays season in New Hampshire rolled around, Sarah wondered, “Where are the Jews?” She’d heard that Bethlehem had a significant Jewish presence. She attended services at BHC and felt at home there. “What I like about BHC is that it’s come as you are. There are many viewpoints and lifestyles and they’re all accepted.” She is impressed by the long history of our synagogue. “It’s rare to find a place as open and beloved as BHC,” she concluded.

        As an adult, Sarah’s perspective on Judaism has evolved. “I don’t see it anymore with the same sense of certainty I had when I was younger,” she explained. “I try to approach Judaism from a place of heritage, how to be a link in the chain. I’m interested in what makes people feel passionate about Judaism.” She has cousins who are Reform Jews and appreciates that “it’s not watered down religion. They’re as committed to their way as the Orthodox.”

        Sarah’s younger sister and family made aliyah a decade ago, and in 2022, Sarah's parents joined them in Israel. Her relatives live in Modiin. Sarah’s most recent trip to Israel was for her niece’s bas mitzvah in November 2023, which took place despite the war. “Terrorists win if we stop living our lives,” she insisted.

        At her niece’s bas mitzvah, Sarah was moved to see that prayers for the hostages and the soldiers deployed in the war were incorporated into the occasion. Additionally, during the party, guests filled bags of goodies for those who were not able to be there and were going to miss Chanukah, a holiday fast approaching. “I liked the feeling that it isn’t a celebration unless you’re connected to the community and making life better for everyone.” One could say Sarah is doing just that at BHC.