Rabbi Bruce Aft gives back to the community as a lay leader, lecturer, chaplain and adjunct professor in northern Virginia. The retired rabbi initially thought he wanted to try for the big leagues.
“I always wanted to be a role model, first as a baseball player, then I was going to be a lawyer and get involved in politics,” Aft said.
But the Watergate scandal of the early 1970s caused him to become “very disillusioned by the political world.” As a result, Aft took a college course in Judaism that ignited a passion.
“That class so excited me to study Judaism instead of just in Hebrew school, that I said, ‘Maybe I could be a rabbi,’” Aft said, admitting that, at the time, he had “no clue what a rabbi did.”
He researched various rabbinical schools before deciding on the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in Wyncote, Pennsylvania.
“For me, being part of community is really important, and building community is extremely important, and deeds of loving-kindness in that community are very important to me,” Aft said.
Students in RRC’s rabbinical program were required to pursue a master’s degree in a secular field, so Aft chose social work, taking on additional classes at nearby Temple University.
After ordination, Aft returned to his hometown of Chicago to serve high school students as a rabbi educator. He worked in that same role in Tucson, Arizona, before moving to Detroit and running a community school for high schoolers and a college for Jewish studies.
In 1991, the husband and father of four relocated to Springfield, Virginia, to serve as Congregation Adat Reyim’s first full-time rabbi. It was his growing family that prompted him to finally settle down.
“When we moved here, my wife said, ‘This is it, pal. We moved from Chicago to Skokie to Tucson,’” Aft said. “She said, ‘This is going to be home.’”
Aft served on several boards and was an educator for BBYO through Adat Reyim, in addition to his duties as spiritual leader.
“When I started, they called themselves La’adat Reyim — translated to ‘gathering as neighbors’ — then we changed it to ‘community of friends,’” he said. “And that’s what we did. We built a community of friends.”
Aft is known for sprinkling his sermons with dad jokes and baseball analogies.
During his three-decade tenure, Aft realized the importance of listening: “I just listened to what people’s needs were.”
“As time has evolved, I think I became a good teacher because I listen to my students,” Aft said. “They teach you that in social work school: Go where your clients are and listen to what their needs are. Actively listen; be present.”
A chaplain on call with the Jewish Social Service Agency, Aft visits retirement homes and hospitals to cheer up the residents and patients, mirroring something he saw his father do growing up.
Aft’s background in social work informed much of how he approached his spiritual leadership.
“People want a presence when they are [dealing with a challenge]; they don’t necessarily want you to speak. They just want you to be there,” Aft said. “They want to know they can count on you. Even my staunchest critics would tell you that I was accessible and that I would listen to them.”
He also encourages others to do the same. Aft has brought together Jewish, Palestinian and Christian students for interfaith dialogue through his role as adjunct professor at George Mason University. He continues this work with the Interfaith Encounter Association in Israel.
Starting in 2021, Aft began teaching at GMU. He teaches classes on Judaism, social justice, the Holocaust and Jews in politics.
“I enjoy the interaction with students,” he said. “I think that if you engage them in conversation and really value what they say, they’ll talk to you, and I treasure those dynamic discussions we have.”
Aft goes above and beyond his role in the lecture hall — he’s launching a series of “healing conversations” sponsored by GMU this fall. The series’ title, “Staying Alive,” is a nod to one of the last conversations Aft had with his late wife before her untimely death in April.
“It’s going to be about keeping hope alive and having conversations about ideas that may separate us, but hopefully we can heal and come together to create a better world, a kinder world,” Aft said. “That’s why I like teaching.”
In 2023, Aft retired from Adat Reyim but continued to lead services and engage in pastoral care as an interim rabbi at Congregation Sha’are Shalom in Leesburg and then at Congregation Beth Emeth in Herndon. He is currently involved as a lay leader at both synagogues plus Kol Ami Reconstructionist Community.
He also continues to lecture on Jewish topics, between the classroom, GMU’s Learning and Retirement Institute and local senior living communities. He plays in the Ponce de Leon Baseball League, a local adult baseball league for men age 30 and older. Aft is a busy man, but he loves what he does.
“When you have the opportunity to make a difference in people’s lives, I just want to maximize that opportunity, make as much of a difference as I can,” he said. “There’s a song: … ‘We May Never Pass This Way (Again).’ Somebody adapted that to say, ‘Any good that I can do, let me do it, because I may never pass this way again.’”
