Rant on attitude toward girls, prayer, and eating
My family is rather at odds with our daughters' school on this. Like many RW schools, the schedule does not accommodate breakfast in school, though the girls are expected to daven together. They are directed to daven brachos before eating at home. That is, obviously, not a lechatchila and seems to assume that women's chiyuv is thus limited. So why bother davening everything else? Also as they do get to eat earlier, they do tend to do other things, as well, before davening, delaying way past ideal time and sometimes barely even making chatzos. Can you ever imagine that being the schedule set for a boy's school? Of course, not! But the RW general trend is to be yotze kol hadeos or at least rov. So why pick up the more mekil views with respect to the chiyuv of tefila and lo tochlu al hadam?
Mean parents that we are, we have our daughters daven the key parts of Shacaharis at home, so they could eat breakfast at home (or on the way) and then coast through the rest with the class once they reach the age of bas mitzvah. That goes against the grain of the school, but we have them do it in a very quiet way, so as not to draw attention to themselves. The downside is that it takes longer for them to get ready in the morning. But the upside is a greater understanding of the halacha and a greater commitment to davening first. Those who get used to this setup feel it gives them license to delay davening after breakfast even when they are no longer in school.
I bring this up now b/c my daughter told me that the schedule for the high school Shabbaton shows that they intend to have the girls only daven brachos before kiddush and proceed to davening after that. As all the girls are already gathered together and are set to breakfast together, there is no logistical expedient to be invoked in this case to create a sha'as hadechak scenario to necessitate compromising on kiddush before davening. So the bedieved setup becomes a lechatchila. If you say that the girls will get hungry before the scheduled meal after davening, then the answer is simple -- make davening earlier! Those who have medical conditions necessitating no delay, obviously, have a heter to eat. But that would be the minority by far.
Visit my site www.kallahmagazine.com -- not just for kallahs. You can also see posts at http://www.examiner.com/x-18522-NY-Jewish-Bridal-Examiner
Mean parents that we are, we have our daughters daven the key parts of Shacaharis at home, so they could eat breakfast at home (or on the way) and then coast through the rest with the class once they reach the age of bas mitzvah. That goes against the grain of the school, but we have them do it in a very quiet way, so as not to draw attention to themselves. The downside is that it takes longer for them to get ready in the morning. But the upside is a greater understanding of the halacha and a greater commitment to davening first. Those who get used to this setup feel it gives them license to delay davening after breakfast even when they are no longer in school.
I bring this up now b/c my daughter told me that the schedule for the high school Shabbaton shows that they intend to have the girls only daven brachos before kiddush and proceed to davening after that. As all the girls are already gathered together and are set to breakfast together, there is no logistical expedient to be invoked in this case to create a sha'as hadechak scenario to necessitate compromising on kiddush before davening. So the bedieved setup becomes a lechatchila. If you say that the girls will get hungry before the scheduled meal after davening, then the answer is simple -- make davening earlier! Those who have medical conditions necessitating no delay, obviously, have a heter to eat. But that would be the minority by far.
Visit my site www.kallahmagazine.com -- not just for kallahs. You can also see posts at http://www.examiner.com/x-18522-NY-Jewish-Bridal-Examiner
Comments