Issue 1

The New Mexico Jewish Journal is now live!

A rainbow appeared during a Navajo healing ceremony for restoration of balance, Torreon, NM photo © Diane Joy Schmidt/nmjewishjournal.com

Over a year ago New Mexico’s Jewish community lost its sole statewide Jewish paper, the New Mexico Jewish Link. In our rural state, which now has an estimated 24,000 Jewish people, the loss of the paper was keenly felt, especially during these fraught times when we need connection more than ever.

Shlomo Karni founded the paper more than fifty years ago, in 1968, and reported to us that, “Volume one, number one had the front page story and picture of Natan Sharansky being imprisoned in the USSR.”

Many in the community have wanted to see a new publication happen. I was the senior writer for the Link for over a decade and finally, felt compelled to do something. This past November, I gathered a group of ten Jewish citizens from across the state and we began meeting online to discuss creating a paper. The volunteer group included journalists, editors, writers, professionals and board members of Jewish organizations, and a rabbi/chaplain connected across many Jewish groups. Her wisdom helped us bridge our differences in those first meetings.

We agreed that, yes! we want a new, independent paper, and to call it the New Mexico Jewish Journal: keeping us connected with news, arts, culture and spirituality. Our mission statement is to connect, inform, enrich and celebrate the vibrant and diverse Jewish communities of New Mexico and the region. Our editorial policy follows the Society for Professional Journalists Code of Ethics, with a commitment to maintaining journalistic independence and the highest standards of accuracy and fairness.

For our theme I chose the Sandhill cranes, who winter in New Mexico along the Rio Grande and who have been here on earth for more than two million years. A sighting of cranes is said to bestow healing, blessings, good fortune and longevity to Native Americans and to other cultures around the world. And, since WWII, through the story of a Japanese girl exposed to radiation who set out to fold a thousand origami cranes, cranes symbolize peace and the innocent victims of war.

Our favicon (the circular icon) is a paper cut art design made by Nan Rubin reflecting our long Jewish history in New Mexico. As she explains, "In the center is the six-petal flower, a symbol used by the hidden Jews of New Mexico, which is overlaid with a Star of David."

Now, as a volunteer committee, we have decided to take a first step — so here our story begins, again, with our first online New Mexico Jewish Journal. We plan to come out online with four primary quarterly editions and intermediate emails with new articles, and to eventually have a print edition.

Hit Subscribe here or any subscribe button and enter your email address to sign up - you can sign up for free and this will ensure you will get the Journal for free, and so we can count our readers!! (that's very important for our metrics—and our morale!) And then open your email to confirm your subscription.

Be a mensch, and choose a paid subscription! We are supported only by your subscriptions and ads from community supporters.

We envision the New Mexico Jewish Journal to be a stimulating, lively commons
(commons: when livestock shared a common pasture. Picture cattle butting heads) for our community—to include community news and upcoming events, arts and culture reviews and essays, columnists, opinion pieces, interviews and profiles, with articles, stories and art on a broad range of interest to the Jewish community.

And, after exploring all the articles on the Home page - be sure to explore all the additional sections - the tabs are visible on the home page on a laptop - but if you reading this on a cell phone, or on an ipad or tablet you might be missing out on this content!! Click the three bars (phone) or three dots (ipad) at the top corner of your screen on the home page for the drop-down menu, to see all the Sections, or, right now, click on each of these here: About (see our names and a photo, and more FAQs), Life Cycle Announcements (obits and weddings and more!) ; Mikvah-Creativity (poetry and stories); Announce, Write, Draw, Submit (more guidelines to send in all your announcements, letters, kibitzing, and stories), and Subscribe, Support, Advertise (more ways to subscribe, and advertising info for Community Supporters, Community Events, Businesses).

And we hope our community will warmly embrace our fledgling New Mexico Jewish Journal and that together we will see the paper take flight.

Diane Joy Schmidt, Publisher and Editor

New Mexico Jewish Journal Volume 1, Number 1, Spring 2024 Adar II, 5784