Rabbi David Blum
Rabbi Blum received a Bachelor of Arts Degree from Yeshiva University, a Masters Degree in Public Administration from Kean University, and Rabbinical Ordination from R.I.E.T.S., the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, an affiliate of Yeshiva University. He is a certified Chaplain via the National Association of Jewish Chaplains.
Email: Commack3@aol.com Phone: (732) 421-8455
Rabbi Stephanie Dickstein, LMSW
Rabbi Dickstein offers spiritual care, Jewish communal connection and individual support through visits to older adults living at home or in senior residences, including devoting special time to Holocaust Survivors. She also offers consultation and support to their caregivers and loved ones. Rabbi Dickstein was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary. She has an MS in Social Work and an MA in Jewish Communal Service. She is the author of the Jewish Healing resource, With Sweetness from The Rock: A Jewish Spiritual Companion for Caregivers. She writes and lectures about spiritual support for aging, nearing the end of life, bereavement, cancer survivors, and pregnancy loss and neonatal death. She previously served as a congregational rabbi, Assistant Dean of the JTS Rabbinical School, in-patient chaplain and Hillel professional.
Email: RabbiDickstein@gmail.com Phone: (732) 512-7363
Rabbi Henoch Polansky
Since 2006, Rabbi Polansky has been the chaplain at two residences of the Jewish Community Housing Corporation, Lester Senior Housing in Whippany and Federation Plaza in West Orange. Prior to that, he was Director of Pastoral Care at Shorefront Jewish Geriatric Center in Brooklyn. He has a vast amount of experience working with the elderly. He grew up assisting his father in a nursing home where he was the rabbi for 30 years, after which he succeeded him in 1982. Rabbi Polansky was ordained at the Mirrer Yeshiva Rabbinical College and have a degree in Pastoral Counseling from the Postgraduate School for Mental Health and four units of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE.)
Email: henpol77@optonline.net Phone: (718) 7571390
Rabbi Alisa Danon
Rabbi Danon is the Jewish chaplain at Mountainside Medical Center in Montclair. She received a BA from The College of William and Mary, an MHL from the University of Judaism, and an MA and ordination from the Jewish Theological Seminary. She has also studied at the Beit Midrash L’limudei ha-Yahadut and Drisha Institute for Jewish Education, and she has done Clinical Pastoral Education at Sinai Hospital (Baltimore, MD) and Palisade Medical Center (North Bergen, NJ). In her work as a chaplain, she seeks to create encounters where compassion, dignity, and respect are valued and where those coping with pain, discomfort, and fear can create meaning and find peace.
Email: alisa.danon@mountainsidehosp.org for hospital-related matters and alisa.danonkaplan@gmail.com for other matters. Phone: (201) 578-4458.
Chaplain Debby Pfeiffer, BCC
Debby Pfeiffer is a board-certified chaplain serving at Morristown Medical Center (MMC) three days a week. She was a speech pathologist for 16 years prior to her pastoral training at Hackensack University Medical Center and Palisades Medical Center. She works in all areas of MMC as part of the medical team, attending to the emotional, spiritual, and ritual needs of Jewish patients and their families.
Email: debby.pfeiffer@gmail.com Phone: (201) 739-9787 (cell) or (973) 971-5306 (Spiritual Care Dept. in Morristown)
Rabbi David Glicksman
Rabbi Glicksman serves as a Federation chaplain specializing in personal visits to the elderly in their homes or in senior residences. He also provides pre-Shabbat and holiday programs for the residents of B’nai Brith Residences and Village Apartments in South Orange. He is also a supervisor in training, offering clinical pastoral education under the auspices of the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy (CPSP). He received his BA in rabbinic ordination (Semicha) and an MS in Jewish Education from Yeshiva University. Rabbi Glicksman was spiritual leader of Congregation Etz Ahaim, a Sephardic congregation in Highland Park, NJ, served as the spiritual leader of Congregation Beth Israel Abraham and Voliner, in Kansas City, MO, and then returned to Central New Jersey to serve as rabbi and later as Director of Pastoral Services at the Central New Jersey Jewish Home for the Aged in Somerset. During which time he pursued four units of Clinical Pastoral Education at Robert Wood Johnson Hospital, New Brunswick, New Jersey, and became certified as a clinical chaplain. He also became certified as a Clinical Fellow in Hospice and Palliative Care.
Email: d.glicksman@yahoo.com Phone: (732) 688-4197
Chaplain Ilisia Kissner BCC
Ilisia Kissner served the Greater Metrowest Jewish community as an educator for over 25 years, both as a teacher and principal in synagogue schools. Her B.A. is from Queens College in New York; M.A. from New York University and Principal’s Certification from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. She completed four units of Clinical Pastoral Education at Overlook Hospital in 2011. After working as a hospice chaplain for two years, she became the Jewish Chaplain at Greystone Park Psychiatric Hospital in Morris Plains and continues to serve in that capacity. She also provides religious services and pastoral care at Village Apartments in South Orange, one of the facilities of the Jewish Community Housing Corporation. She is a member of the Neshama Association of Jewish Chaplains and became a Board-Certified Chaplain in 2016.
Email: ilisia.kissner@gmail.com Phone: (973) 699-8376
Rabbi Daniel Geretz, BCCC, Supervisor In-Training
Rabbi Geretz grew up in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and has lived in New Jersey since graduating college. He has worked in information technology and had about a decade of lay leadership experience in the Jewish community prior to deciding to change careers and go into the rabbinate. He was awarded semikha by YCT Rabbinical School, and subsequently became board certified as a clinical chaplain and pastoral counselor by the CPSP (College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy). He currently serves as a Federation chaplain at Morristown Medical Center two days each week, is a clinical supervisor-in-training at RWJUH Hamilton outside of Trenton, and is the founding rabbi of Maayan, a partnership minyan in West Orange.
Email: danny@geretz.org Phone: (732) 266-1214