Rabbi spreads Jewish word in Mormon realm

[Moloch]

For almost 15 years, Rabbi Benny Zippel has been in a job that calls for an unlimited supply of optimism. Think of Captain Ahab going after Moby Dick with nothing but a fork and tartar sauce.

Day in, day out, Zippel's mission is to spread the joys of being Jewish in a state where more than 70 percent of the population is Mormon and just about everybody else is from another Christian denomination.

"When I got my assignment, I had never even heard of Utah," he confessed. "I actually had to go look it up in an atlas. At first I thought they meant Uganda."

Zippel, 38, is a shliach--one of 4,000 emissaries of the late Lubavitcher rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Schneerson, leader of Chabad-Lubavitch, an Orthodox sect dedicated to the strictest adherence to Jewish law. These troops fan out to every corner of the globe, encouraging Jews with even the most casual affiliation to elevate their faith beyond bagels and "Seinfeld" to keeping kosher, studying the Torah and observing holidays, including Hanukkah, which started Tuesday evening.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=2027&ncid=2027&e=6&u=/chitribts/20041208/ts_chicagotrib/rabbispreadsjewishwordinmormonrealm

[aquart]

1. Missionary, meet missionary.

What a stew.

[Raster]

2. Bon Appetite!

[Voltaire99]

3. "At first I thought they meant Uganda."

Heh.

No, Rabbi. They know how to have fun in Uganda.