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STEVEN JOHN: With news from Minnesota Public Radio, I'm Steven John. A group of insurance companies has failed in their court bid to block the demolition of the Farmland Foods plant damaged by fire last July. Judge James Broberg denied the insurers motion based on their lack of standing to intervene in the process. Eight insurance companies had asked the court to block demolition, saying the pork processing facility in Albert Lea can be rebuilt. City officials and Farmland want the structure torn down to make way for something new.

Two state lawmakers are working on legislation that would keep the official governor's residence open. Governor Ventura has said he would close the Summit Avenue mansion and move back to his Maple Grove ranch at the end of April. DFL senators Dean Johnson and Richard Cohen say their plan is to amend the overall budget reconciliation bill to allow the governor to move yet keep the building open.

Minnesota Department of Transportation officials are launching a new three-digit cell phone number to help travelers get news on road conditions and weather. Cellular phone users can dial 511 to get the information. Yesterday, MnDOT announced what will be the biggest road construction season ever. Officials say this summer will see work on close to 300 projects around the state. Ginny Crowson is a MnDOT travel information coordinator. She says the 511 service is part of a national plan.

GINNY CROWSON: The idea is that you'll have one number to call, not only in Minnesota, but across the country to get information about what might be affecting your travel, whether it's a road construction project or it's a blizzard in Minnesota that's closing roads, what have you.

STEVEN JOHN: Crowson says drivers will soon be able to also get traffic information. Partly to mostly cloudy skies. Breezy today, scattered rain, and snow showers developing in the West. A chance of a rain or snow shower in the East. Highs in the 40s. Too low, 50s in the Twin Cities, it's sunny and 50 degrees. That's news. I'm Steven John.

SPEAKER: Programming on Minnesota Public Radio is supported by Chiang Mai Thai, featuring Thai dishes created with the traditional balance of hot, sour, salty, and sweet flavors located in uptown. Reservations accepted, 612-827-1606.

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MIKE MULCAHY: And six minutes now past 12. And this hour on Midday, as part of our Voices of Minnesota interview series, we hear from three women whose social activism defines their work. Amal Yusuf is founder and director of the Somalian Women's Association in Minneapolis. Sister Gabriel Herbers has spent her life helping troubled women. And Rabbi Marsha Zimmerman is the senior religious leader at her Minneapolis synagogue. Here's Minnesota Public Radio's Dan Olson.

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DAN OLSON: Census numbers show Minnesota's Somali immigrant population is one of the largest in the country. The recent killing by Minneapolis police of a mentally ill Somali man carrying a crowbar and a machete is criticized by some Somalis as evidence of the discrimination they face as Africans and Muslims in this state. Amal Yusuf helped organize one of the demonstrations where people protested the police action. However, even as some Somalis criticized police for the shooting, many of them say Minnesota is a good home. That's the view of Amal Yusuf, who has been in Minnesota since 1996.

She's the founder and President of the Somalian women's association, based in Minneapolis. The association helps Somali families find housing, health care, and other services. Yusuf says she works with many refugees who escaped Somalia only to end up in sprawling and sometimes lawless refugee camps in Kenya, where they waited for years before getting permission to go to another country. I talked with Amal Yusuf at her office in Minneapolis.

For those people who came through the refugee camps, what was life there like for them?

AMAL YUSUF: I think a lot of them had fear and have went through a lot. We have seen families who have been raped-- women who have been raped at refugee camps by the Kenyan soldiers. We have seen families who have been tortured by the Kenyan police.

I mean, imagine someone who is in a refugee camp. And they come to Nairobi, Kenya, because that's where the INS and the GVA and the process, in fact, takes place for coming to the United States. And to be there, you have to live and remain in that city for your process. You have to be documented. And they're not documented to be in that area.

So what happens, they are vulnerable for these corrupted government and police, and they are captured because they don't have a so-called legal document to remain in the city. And then they have to bribe the police. And a lot of them have been showering us with stories when they are arrested.

And simply because even though they know they're refugees, they are arrested because I guess the police don't have money and resources. And they're trying to target the Somalis so that they can get money from them.

DAN OLSON: When people from Somalia arrive in Minnesota, generally speaking, what kind of welcome are they getting?

AMAL YUSUF: Comparing to other states, I think Minnesota has been a very welcoming state. Not only does it provide the services and the support, but also the people of Minnesota are very friendly. And I think that's one of the ways why many of Somalis come and why Minnesota is very attractive to many of the Somalis, despite the weather.

And also another reason why many of them are coming to Minnesota is having the friends. I mean, when they heard in a refugee camp or a neighbor in Somalia is doing well in Minnesota, working, going to school, have a housing affordable or adequate housing where they can live-- and when they heard how that friend is doing well, then that attracts more people to the state as well.

DAN OLSON: How soon do many of them find work? Almost right away?

AMAL YUSUF: I wouldn't say almost right away. I guess that varies based on skills. But I think that employment has really become very difficult since September 11. And I know the economy is not doing well. But yet, I think that despite the economy situation, we are hardly impacted by the lack of employment opportunity.

DAN OLSON: What do you see happening? Are many of the Somalis, people from Somalia who arrive in Minnesota, are they staying? Or are they moving on to other states, spreading out around the country?

AMAL YUSUF: Yes, that's happening. And I think primarily the reason is why it's happening is for two. One is for housing that are enough for the family or places they can live. And Minneapolis seem to be overcrowded. So that is stretching people into the suburban.

We have an office in Eden Prairie. A lot of the women that I met, we have helped them apply housing in that area because they were living in neighborhoods where they were beaten. They were robbed. Safety was an issue. Some of the women that worked in the night and catch the bus, they were harassed and robbed on Franklin and Chicago.

So that was one of the reason, too, why many of them had to move. Not only that, but also the large of the family and affordability. And now it's much safer. I mean, many of them can work from their home to Eden Prairie shopping center when they're not afraid of anything.

DAN OLSON: How are white Minnesotans adapting to the presence of people from Somalia?

AMAL YUSUF: Over time, it's getting better, the more that people see and understand. But I think still, there is a education gap. I mean, still, we see either the stigma or stereotypes or people questioning who really these people are.

And also since September 11, many Somali women have been targeted because of their dress. And not only because of their dress, but because their dress is also a symbol where they are easily identifiable. And still, I think there is more education needs to happen.

And we are working on creating educational materials that will help Minnesotans, not only white Minnesotans, but all Minnesotans who should understand about the dress codes. And I hope that, also, the employers would be more acceptance, even though some have been trying to accommodate that. Because we have great workers in the community that are honest and hardworking. And I would love to see those people being hired.

DAN OLSON: How are the children doing? Are they going right into school and most of them flourishing and learning the language quickly?

AMAL YUSUF: It depends on the age. I think some of them are going to schools and are able to master their language and skills easily. But still, the frustration is out there. When I say that, I mean the education gap and the placement of ages versus education in the school system. That is creating more frustration to the students and also stigma.

I mean, I have seen children who are pulled out from classes and placed into special ed classes because they could not catch up with the other students. And indeed, they did not have disabilities. But the ages and the level they were placed was not the right level for them because of the gap that was out there.

And my heart is with those mothers who are telling us these horrendous stories about what's happening to their children. Some of them are having hard time even understanding why their children are pulled out and said, they need special ed, they have attention deficit disorder, and so on and so on when that's not out there.

It's the communication. It's the culture. You're dealing somebody who have not been in-- who have been fleeing from country to country and trying to get a basic life. And now you have the teachers that are taking a different approach in the school system and saying, your children have disability when they're doing fine. I guess that needs an immediate attention.

DAN OLSON: Amal Yusuf, founder and president of the Somalian Women's Association. Yusuf is only 24 years old. However, she's been through a lot in her young life. She and the rest of her family fled Somalia in the early 1990s when the country's long-simmering civil war exploded.

Her father was a high level member of Somalia's former government. Yusuf says he was killed in the fighting. 20 members of the family resettled in India. However, Yusuf says conditions were not good. So at age 15, never having been apart from her family, Amal Yusuf set off alone for Paris, where she would try to locate a cousin.

AMAL YUSUF: And when I came to France, I had nobody other than myself. So I was about 15 years old.

DAN OLSON: What did you do?

AMAL YUSUF: It has been very difficult. First of all, when I arrived at the airport, I knew how to speak English, but then the French police did not talk to me. And they gave me a hard time. Whenever I say English, they'll say something French to me. And I end up three hours at the airport. Finally, they understood what I was saying. But still, they were forcing me to speak French. So they did let me into the country.

DAN OLSON: Yusuf says she was warned repeatedly by family members not to trust strangers, and she followed the advice. However, she recalls in at least two instances, strangers directed her to help. People in France directed her to a train for the Netherlands, where with directions from other strangers, she found her way to a United Nations' refugee camp, which would become her temporary home for several years.

When Amal Yusuf came to the United States as a refugee, she arrived in New York City, once again, all alone. She was on her way to Washington, DC, to look for another relative. Still, trusting no one, Yusuf says she was helped by another stranger, a bus rider who overheard her ask directions for a dangerous part of the city.

AMAL YUSUF: And he said, you're going to 44th Street by yourself dressed up like this with all of these bags? And I said, what's wrong with that? And he says, you must be out of your mind. Do you know how that is? And I said, no, I don't know. And he says, I'm going to have to help you. You girl, you can't go there.

So he did escort me. I didn't know that-- and this place is so dark, too. And I get the ticket. He put me in this bus and made sure that the driver ensures that when i get to DC, he lets me-- she lets me know the driver was woman.

DAN OLSON: Yusuf finally located relatives. They had moved to Minnesota. She joined them and, because of her English proficiency, found work in a hospital as a translator. Amal Yusuf says she's thankful for the treatment governments have given her and other refugees. It's part of the reason, she says, she started the Somalian Women's Association.

AMAL YUSUF: I have a great respect for countries that accommodate for refugees, simply because of the human behavior and characteristics of people that they bring together and they deal with it. They have people who have various mental issues and disabilities and behaviors, and bringing that into one location and treating them is something that changed completely my heart and my way of viewing the world.

DAN OLSON: Really, how did it change?

AMAL YUSUF: I want to contribute to people, which is why I've chosen to do this kind of work right now because of what I have seen. And in that sense, it did change my way of viewing the world.

DAN OLSON: Amal Yusuf, very nice talking with you. Thank you so much for your time.

AMAL YUSUF: Thank you very much, too. And I'm pleased to be able to share with you my story.

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DAN OLSON: Amal Yusuf, president of the Somalian Women's Association based in Minneapolis. You're listening to Voices of Minnesota on Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Dan Olson. Later in the hour, a conversation with Rabbi Marsha Zimmerman from Temple Israel in Minneapolis.

Like Amal Yusuf, 82-year-old Sister Gabriel Herbers has spent most of her life helping people. She's counseled girls and women often labeled as society's outcasts. Herbers is a social worker who belongs to the Sisters of the Good Shepherd. She's lived in different cities around the country but has invariably found her way back to Minnesota.

I talked with her recently at her one-room apartment at the Sisters of Good Shepherd convent in North Oaks. Sister Gabriel Herbers grew up on a farm near New Vienna, Iowa. After finishing high school in 1939, she made an uncommon career choice for a young woman of that era.

GABRIEL HERBERS: My mother said to me, now, what are you going to major in? And I said, oh, I'm going to I'm going to be a CPA, I'm going to be a certified public accountant when I finished. She said, what? I remember this was a long time-- and I said, yeah. Oh, no, she said, if that's what you're going to do, we're not going to pay for you to go through college.

DAN OLSON: She didn't think much of the CPA, I assume?

GABRIEL HERBERS: No, no, not one little bit. And so I said, well, in that case, then-- I said, what do you want me to do? And what do you want me to study? And she said, I want you to take home ec. Oh, I said, forget it. [LAUGHS]

DAN OLSON: Why was she so opposed, do you think, to the CPA idea?

GABRIEL HERBERS: Well, because girls don't do that kind of thing, she told me. Girls don't become CPAs. And I said, oh, yes, they do.

DAN OLSON: So you stood up to her.

GABRIEL HERBERS: Yes, this one's going to do it. Well, I never did, of course, because I didn't get to college then

DAN OLSON: You did not get to college.

GABRIEL HERBERS: No, well, I wouldn't go. Because when she said I had to take home economics, I said, well, that I'm just not going, I'll do other things.

DAN OLSON: This was one of your first acts of resistance was against your mother.

GABRIEL HERBERS: [LAUGHS] Probably. I never thought of it that way.

DAN OLSON: But she knew you. And I suppose this wasn't totally unexpected behavior. Is that right?

GABRIEL HERBERS: I don't know. But I think she was surprised I was that adamant about it. So I did-- I joined the group in town that did plays. So I would put on plays. I had a good time. I went on dates every night.

One night, I came home. It was 3 o'clock in the morning. And suddenly, a thought darted through my head and said, what are you doing with your life? And I was suddenly sober. And I said, oh, yeah, what am I doing? I'm 19 years old or whatever it was. And my life, it's almost gone there. I haven't decided what I'm going to do with it.

DAN OLSON: Where do you suppose that thought came from?

GABRIEL HERBERS: That was the Holy Spirit.

DAN OLSON: You think so? You're not making-- you're not being facetious?

GABRIEL HERBERS: No, I think it was God speaking to me.

DAN OLSON: Sister Gabriel says she remembers as a child being told about a Catholic order of nuns, the Sisters of the Good Shepherd, whose work most closely resembled that of priests, which she says is what she really wanted to be. So she joined the order at what was then called the College of Saint Thomas, took her vows, and was trained as a social worker. At the beginning, she worked with teenage girls who others called incorrigible. Judges sent them to residential facilities run by Herbers' order.

GABRIEL HERBERS: They had problems like being incorrigible, being beyond the control of the parents, runaways from school, runaways from home, a lot of felonies-- shoplifting and that kind of thing.

DAN OLSON: These were tough kids.

GABRIEL HERBERS: Tough, yes, they had problems.

DAN OLSON: Did you have to use a lot of, frankly, physical discipline?

GABRIEL HERBERS: We never used physical discipline.

DAN OLSON: How did you cope with these kids?

GABRIEL HERBERS: Well, you had to be very creative. And what I learned was that if you truly love people, they will respond to that love. And that is really true. I remember when I was in Spokane one time, there was one girl was being remanded to the courts because she had tried-- she drank a Lysol one time to commit suicide. And she was always doing these awful things. And no matter what we did, she just would not be controlled.

But she liked me a lot. And I was not working in the class, as they say, at that time. So she would sit and talk to me. And when she knew that she was being remanded back to the court, she said, how can you do this to me? She said, I thought you were supposed to love me no matter what I did?

And I said, that's true, and we do love you. But sometimes there comes a breaking point. I said, just think of all the things you have done and see how many times, how long a person can take that. And I could say that because I wasn't the one who had been on the receiving end of it.

DAN OLSON: Looking back on it, do you think that this young woman who tried to kill herself or maybe some of the others you worked with were clinically depressed or had other mental illnesses?

GABRIEL HERBERS: Yes, some of them did. And some of them needed psychiatric care. And if they were really bad, we did refer them to a psychiatrist.

DAN OLSON: So there was treatment.

GABRIEL HERBERS: There was treatment.

DAN OLSON: How many came out of it OK?

GABRIEL HERBERS: Well, the majority came out OK. They used to say 85% were not recidivists. They made it on the first go around, which is pretty good.

DAN OLSON: What did they need? What was the solution?

GABRIEL HERBERS: The solution was they needed a firm-- they needed, as they would say, tough love. And they needed to be learned how to follow rules and respect the rules and know what the limits-- what limits there were in order to be successful. We had to provide motivation for them by talking to them and trying to show them what is life all about and trying to get them to look at what they wanted from life.

And once we get them to say what they wanted from life, then we had something to work with. And then we could keep feeding that back to them.

DAN OLSON: What kinds of homes had these kids come from?

GABRIEL HERBERS: Most of them were from broken homes and with homes with problems.

DAN OLSON: And so it was a combination of time, the discipline, the firmness that you gave them, the great care, the great love that you gave them. And that worked for a lot of them.

GABRIEL HERBERS: It did. Some might not have made it at the very first go round. But ultimately, they made it. And they would come back later in life and say, I made it, I'm doing this, I made it because of you, because of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd.

DAN OLSON: A few years ago, Herbers and others made news as they took on the owners of Saint Paul's sex businesses. They succeeded in closing down porno movie houses at Dale and University in Saint Paul's Frogtown neighborhood. Then working with residents, Herbers tried to end the sex trade on the neighborhood's residential streets. She says she told the prostitutes their line of work was dangerous and wrong, but that they could always come to her for friendship.

GABRIEL HERBERS: In Frogtown, I wasn't running any facility. I was living in a house on Charles Street. And I was working with the people there. Whenever they would need, they would come to me-- whatever they needed, I would work with them on that. And then I worked with Bill Wilson to close the theaters on Dale and University.

DAN OLSON: These were the porno theaters.

GABRIEL HERBERS: Right. Right.

DAN OLSON: You were living in that house. And you were befriending-- among others, you were providing sanctuary for prostitutes.

GABRIEL HERBERS: I mean, the prostitutes would come and see me, right. I didn't exactly provide sanctuary for them, I don't believe. But I would help them. And they knew that I would help them.

DAN OLSON: How did they know that? How had you gotten to know them?

GABRIEL HERBERS: Oh, I think there was a group, a neighborhood group that was objecting to the prostitution. And one night, we went out on the street. And they wanted to introduce me to some real prostitutes, because I had only heard about them. I hadn't seen any of those gals.

And I met-- I remember right in the middle of University Avenue on the island, they introduced me to this prostitute who had just gotten herself all greased up and everything, ready to go out on the street. And they said-- they introduced her and said, this is Sister Gabriel. I was ready to kick them, but she almost fell into the street. And she got out of my sight as fast as she could. Oh, she says, I've never looked at-- I've never seen a nun looking like this.

[LAUGHS] And I said, you don't have to worry. I'm not upset by the way you look. [LAUGHS] And then I met several others after that. We would go out on the street. Because there's one guy who was working on it. He thought that if we could just talk to them, that they would change.

Well, I think that to a certain extent, that was true. But there needed something else. There's one process--

DAN OLSON: At this point in the conversation, Sister Gabriel names a woman she's known for 17 years. In just the past few months, Herbers says the woman has told her she's getting out of prostitution.

GABRIEL HERBERS: She always would call me-- I mean, she has maintained the contact with me. I haven't worked to keep the contact with her, but she has maintained the contact with me. Whenever she would get into jail, she would call me. Or she would somehow try to reach me.

And so I've maintained contact. And this last go around, I went to see her quite regularly at the jail after I came back here. And she said, I think I'm going to quit now.

DAN OLSON: Why has she decided to make this decision? Did she tell you?

GABRIEL HERBERS: Well, she didn't. And she's too proud to tell. I think she felt that she was getting pretty old. What is she now? She's close to 40. And for her, for a prostitute, that's getting old.

DAN OLSON: And she resisted you at every turn in terms of your, I assume--

GABRIEL HERBERS: With the prostitutes, I never attempted to tell them to change their lifestyle. I told them that their lifestyle was dangerous. I told them that, eventually, they would be killed. And I told them that I would always be their friend, but I was not going to be their therapist or somebody who would tell them what they had to do. But they could always count on me as being their friend.

DAN OLSON: Why do you think she's kept up contact with you for so long?

GABRIEL HERBERS: Because I was her friend. There was another time, I had another prostitute. And she had decided that she was going to get out of prostitution. And she had met this man. They were going to set up housekeeping, get married. And so she needed stuff. She needed sheets and-- needed everything.

So I had some-- I had a lot of sheets and pillowcases that I had begged, borrowed, or stolen from people. And so I told her to come to my apartment and come and get them. And I remember, I had them in my-- I had a bunch in my arms. And she came up the stairs. And she said, put that down and please give me a hug.

And that was the thing that she needed most. And that's what she wanted. And when she was able to ask for it. And they knew that I loved them. And they knew that I cared about them in spite of what they did and that I was accepting them because they were who they were and not because of what they did or didn't do.

DAN OLSON: Were you nearly alone in that? Weren't there others who could be their friends?

GABRIEL HERBERS: Not very many. Not very many. Because most people couldn't tolerate that. I know priests who told me that I was aiding and abetting them by doing that. And I said, oh, no, Father, I'm not.

DAN OLSON: Your great care and compassion for these people, I very strongly suspect, does not mean you suspend judgment about what they do with their lives.

GABRIEL HERBERS: No, I tell them that I hate what they're doing, and they know that. But you see, most people can't-- it's very hard for people to separate what the person does from who they are. Who they are is not necessarily what they do. The human being that they are, the human person that they are is one thing. And the awful things that they do over here is another thing. And you don't kill them because they do those awful things.

DAN OLSON: Sister Gabriel Herbers is frequently on the Marshall Avenue Bridge between Minneapolis and Saint Paul on Wednesday afternoons, where she and others protest the US sanctions against Iraq. She's protested at and been arrested for demonstrations at the School of the Americas, the military training program in Georgia, whose students include Central American military personnel linked to some of that region's most brutal repression. Sister Gabriel says the wave of patriotism sweeping across the country these days is blinding Americans to problems in other countries.

GABRIEL HERBERS: Since the bombing of the Afghanistan, we have also added the children of Afghanistan to our list that we support and ask the bombing to stop, too, because we want to save the children.

DAN OLSON: I'm guessing that the protests are not getting as much sympathetic response these days after September 11 as perhaps when you started.

GABRIEL HERBERS: I think that's very true. I still feel that the people who drive by on the bridge, they're very many. I think there's just as many supporters now as there have been. However, the general attitude of the public is that this is not American. We're not being patriotic.

I also believe that we should spend less time being patriotic and think more about the world that we're living in. And maybe instead of having a US, the stars and stripes, we need to have a world flag that symbolizes all the people of the world and to symbolize our unity as one world, because that's where we're coming to. And that's what we have.

Well, I think we have come to that. What we do here impinges on them, and what they do impinges on us. We need to have some symbol to say that we are one rather than to divide us. And I think right now, the stars and stripes divide us, especially with the attitude that we have about them at this time.

DAN OLSON: The stars and stripes divide us, how, do you think?

GABRIEL HERBERS: That we are the good people, we are the ones that are in control, and what we do is right and what everybody else does is wrong. And when we think of the World Trade Center going down, that went down for a reason. And most of that can be traced back to our behavior toward the different countries that we say are involved.

DAN OLSON: Instead of the reason that it was the act of--

GABRIEL HERBERS: Terrorist.

DAN OLSON: --a person some people call a mad man and his--

GABRIEL HERBERS: You're right. He may be about-- He may be mad, but there's really nothing mad about him. He's just trying to salvage his own-- to try to get some justice somehow. And it's the same as dealing with the prostitutes. You have to love the people and have to give them an opportunity to grow and to be who they are instead of saying, all that stuff you're doing is wrong and get out of here.

So allow them to be. And we have to do the same way with the countries. We have to allow them to be and to grow and help them to grow and not milk them of all the goods that they have.

DAN OLSON: 82-year-old sister Gabriel Herbers' vision is fading. She reads with the aid of a video camera, which enlarges words and puts them on a huge television set. There are several boxes in the corner of her single-room apartment at the Sisters of the Good Shepherd headquarters in North Oaks. The boxes are filled with letters from women she's helped over the years.

GABRIEL HERBERS: I always try to answer their letters, but I'm not always successful in doing that.

DAN OLSON: Well, it would be nice, in the best of all worlds, I suppose, to be able to respond to a letter-- to the letters. Maybe they just needed to write them.

GABRIEL HERBERS: I guess that's true. But it's no fun to write a letter and not hear from the person to whom you've written.

DAN OLSON: There's probably a book in those letters, how their lives are better.

GABRIEL HERBERS: Yes, some of them are, or how they run into new problems now that they're married and have children of their own, then they expect me to solve those problems for their children. [LAUGHS]

DAN OLSON: Sister Gabriel Herbers, thank you so much for talking with me.

GABRIEL HERBERS: Thank you, Dan. This has been wonderful.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

DAN OLSON: Sister Gabriel Herbers has been a nun with the Sisters of the Good Shepherd for 62 years. You're listening to Voices of Minnesota on Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Dan Olson.

Rabbi Marsha Zimmerman is one of only a relative handful of women in this country who lead large synagogues. Last year, she was elected senior rabbi at Temple Israel in Minneapolis. The first Reform Judaism woman rabbi was ordained in 1972. The first woman senior rabbi was elected leader of a synagogue shortly after that. About 40% of this country's Jews are reform. Many other Jews do not accept women as religious leaders.

Marsha Zimmerman grew up in a suburb of Saint Louis, Missouri. She talked with Minnesota Public Radio's Krista Tippett about her decision to become a rabbi.

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: My father was a scientist. And so he really believed until more recently, in his older years-- but he always wanted things to be defined, to be explained, to be proven. And religion doesn't do that, where my mother was much more of a religious person early on and upheld the traditions. And the things that didn't always make sense were still very important to her. And she taught them to all of us.

So we had a sort of a balance, but we did grow up in a reform congregation. And that's the tradition in which I have become a rabbi, and it has always been a very strong foundation of who I am.

KRISTA TIPPETT: So you went to Macalester. And tell me about the path that took you into studying to become a rabbi.

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: When I was at Macalester was in the late '70s. The first woman was ordained in 1972. But between '72 and '77, when I first met a woman who was enrolled in rabbinical school, there were only a handful of women.

So to have met a woman who was either in rabbinical school or ordained was very unusual. A woman came to the University of Minnesota. And she came. And she spoke to us at our Hebrew house, which we had on campus, which sort of an offshoot of the university Hillel system.

And she just had to be there. She didn't have to say a word. And I was like, this is exactly what I want to do.

KRISTA TIPPETT: Just physically seeing a woman who was a rabbi.

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: Just physically, yes. And I remember asking her a question about her classes. What are you studying? Very excited, enthusiastic. She just had a typical response of somebody who's in the midst of studies. Well, this professor is kind of not really a wonderful professor. And she had more critiques, but it didn't matter to me. It was that I was talking to somebody who actually had made the step to be in rabbinical school was just so exciting to me. And so--

KRISTA TIPPETT: Had you felt excited about male rabbis in your earlier life?

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: No.

KRISTA TIPPETT: It was really-- so it was really that fact of--

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: Really, It Was this opportunity. I had never seen a female rabbi. And well, I had teachers who were male rabbis and rabbis who were important to our family. There wasn't the same touching of my soul that there was with this woman.

KRISTA TIPPETT: What did your family think when you first started talking to them about this?

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: I got very involved in the feminist movement, and I was looked at by my family as a little strange. So they thought this was just a continuation of being a feminist because they themselves had never met a female rabbi before either. That was interesting.

I tell this story often about my father answering the phone right after I had met this woman who was in rabbinical school. I called my family. I said, dad, I just met this female rabbinical student. And he said, you don't want to do that, so.

[LAUGHTER]

And I said, from that day on, it was the journey towards it. [LAUGHS] But through the years, they have really supported me and loved the fact that my journey has brought me to the place that I am today as the senior rabbi of Temple Israel.

KRISTA TIPPETT: So you were named senior rabbi at Temple Israel on July 1, 2001. And that's two months before, in some sense, the world changed in this country. And I think in the press, in terms of observing the religious phenomena around September 11, we focused a lot on church attendance. And I would really like to hear from your perspective as a rabbi in a large Jewish synagogue congregation, what changed. What are the effects you continue to feel?

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: It is interesting. Because as the Jewish community and because so much of the terrorism was centered in the Middle East, we heightened security for the High Holidays, which was very, very soon after September 11. It was the following week. There was a real fear that we potentially could be the target, especially in the early days of the terrorist attack.

We didn't know who was responsible, exactly what was happening. It wasn't totally clear who, what, and where was responsible. And in the early days, Israel definitely was held up as a possible reason for the attack. So we had fear mixed in personal fear mixed in with a national fear.

KRISTA TIPPETT: And that is a huge difference because I think Christians went to their churches, and. That felt like a safe place.

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: It felt like a safe place. And in the first days, we were definitely wanted to do some kind of religious service. And without much knowledge, we turned to our downtown churches to gather there in the church rather than at Temple in order to have interfaith services. Temple was not going to be the place at the top of the list at first because we didn't want to bring anybody into an unsafe place. So that is very different, and I'm not sure that has come out so clearly. I haven't read much about that kind of change.

KRISTA TIPPETT: So has September 11 in some way made some changes to your role as a rabbi? Are there certain things that are more important now than they were before?

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: I think that with all the violence that has been happening in Israel-- and we are very focused on the Mideast. And we always are. What's different, actually, is that the whole world is now focused there, too. And I found that so interesting because so many of the people of my congregation would come up and say, rabbi, people are asking me questions about the Middle East, and I don't know all the answers to them.

While we always care about Israel, we were not experts in the Middle East. And just looking at Tom Friedman, who has become the-- and he's always been. I mean, I've kept up with Tom Friedman for years and years and years, but he has become the voice. Because he is an expert. And to turn to people who are Jewish, who are co-workers and ask the questions you would ask a Tom Friedman put that person into a place of really thinking about their sense of Israel and the Middle East.

DAN OLSON: You're listening to Voices of Minnesota conversation with Rabbi Marsha Zimmerman on Minnesota Public Radio. Zimmerman has been at Temple Israel in Minneapolis for 14 years. She was elected senior rabbi last year, one of relatively few women reform rabbis to lead a large synagogue. Here's the rest of her conversation with Minnesota Public Radio's Krista Tippett.

KRISTA TIPPETT: So what I'd really like to ask you is, how you as a rabbi and as a person of faith and just speaking for yourself, how you view that tragedy that is unfolding there now, that terror through your faith.

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: Well, it's a very personal reality. I mean, my husband's first cousins are there. And every time there's an attack, we are right at the telephone or email. So for much of the Jewish community, including myself, we have family there. It's not something distant at all, but very present in our lives.

So I think that's the first place to begin is with the personal. And I was in Israel two years ago, February, and it was such a hopeful time. It was right before the second wave of this intifada. And it was so exciting, not without trepidation and fear and concern, but Israel was a place that was just the sky was the limit.

Everybody felt like peace had to happen. They were not happy about what would happen to Jerusalem. But when you ask the question in the polls, Would you give part of Jerusalem away? they'd say no. But said, If Jerusalem was at the center of the peace process, would it be a negotiable item? everybody said yes. It was hard. So it was how you phrased the question. And so it was such a wonderful time. Camp David gathering and then the falling apart a year ago, High Holidays, right before Rosh Hashanah.

And it's just been demoralizing, really, from that time. We've seen just the escalation of violence like never before. And it's been very disheartening and very upsetting thing. And what we have to do is always hold out that peace is the goal. And we have to get there.

Now there have been some encouraging things along the way, and I hope that-- not to get into a political discussion, although that is where you go when you look at Israel. Both sides definitely need to look at themselves. It was disappointing for me that Arafat wasn't the leader that I thought he was and that he could be. He wasn't.

But I don't-- that's who they're putting forth. And so we're going to have to deal on some level, even though there are some second-level people who are really good and who understand the peace process very different and are speaking with Israelis. That's wonderful.

The settlements are a problem, there's no question. And we have to look at that from a Israeli perspective. It's not helpful to have resources go to one part of a community. And right next door, no resources at all. And we have to look at that.

But suicide bombing has no excuse. Killing innocent people has no excuse. And we need to go forward holding those responsible and moving on to peace.

KRISTA TIPPETT: So again, as a rabbi, how do you experience your role? What do you experience your role to be now with that specter in everyone's mind in your congregation, surely? And again, through the lens of faith, how do you lead people through this time as American Jews?

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: Well, I think that you both recognize the frustration and the fears. And you have to move ahead. I'm taking a group of people to Israel June 20th through the 30th. That's how I lead. I lead because I feel a responsibility to Israel. I feel a responsibility as an American Jew to go there and be with them in this most difficult time. And there are people in my congregation who are going with me.

And so those are the ways that I lead. And you speak about it so often. Every single gathering of prayer that we have, which is daily, we recognize the torn Middle East and pray for peace every single day. That's how we lead.

And it's by keeping those communications open and by staying ahead of the curve. If I only read one press, that wouldn't be enough. My job is to go beyond. And so my husband and I, every night before we go to bed, we go on the internet and read the Israeli press. We read The Jerusalem Post. We read The Forward. That's my job, too, is to be well informed so that I can speak and articulate a position with accurate information.

KRISTA TIPPETT: We started out talking about your family and your upbringing and your grandparents. And for them, for Jews of that generation, anti-Semitism in some form was a huge issue. I wonder, for your generation and the young people who you're raising in your congregation, what would you name as challenges of Jewish identity? And maybe it's related to September 11, too.

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: It is. It's interesting. I think that anti-Semitism is a reality, but how much of a reality-- and previous generations have turned to it as a way of saying, this is the way I have my identity is because people hate me. Well, that's not a great way to have an identity. You want to have something that's more powerful and internal.

But anti-Semitism is a reality out there, there's no question. And that was the fear. The initial fear was because it's real.

KRISTA TIPPETT: The initial fear of September 11.

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: September 11. because it's real. And I don't separate anti-Zionism and anti-Israel from anti-Semitism. So I think too many people have tried to make that differentiation. I don't. Doesn't mean you can't have a critique of Israel and its government. I'm not saying that. But if you don't believe in a Jewish state, then you really, in my mind, are very connected to that anti-Semitism.

But we have assimilation, too, in this country. There's a great deal of assimilation. So that's almost the antidote-- not the antidote, but the antithesis of anti-Semitism is that we can pass so easily that we choose to pass. And that's another danger in our community. We really are a minority community. And so our continuity is at stake, and assimilation is a huge risk to that.

Knowledge is another place where Jews, they're knowledgeable about many other things. They've taken the idea of education, which is a Jewish value to a remarkable place in many, many disciplines. But as far as Judaism is concerned, they have very little knowledge. And so that's a part that needs to be elevated.

So those are the things that I myself see as real concerns for our community.

KRISTA TIPPETT: And as the teacher, the rabbi.

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: And as the teacher as the rabbi, my job is to instill pride and to instill knowledge and to instill hope that although we have always been a small group of people, that we have had a large effect on the world and that we should feel that pride. And we have to continue that tradition.

It doesn't just happen by itself. It takes a real hard work and loyalty. It takes discipline and it takes a connection to a spiritual understanding of god, to the words of our sacred text of Torah, and to a community that has a commanding voice. We have a responsibility to the Jewish community as well as the wider community.

KRISTA TIPPETT: But also what I hear is that tending these traditions then strengthens the contribution, the very particular contribution that Judaism has to make as we all move forward into all of these complex issues.

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: Well, again, I think that we live in a world that says your particular differences are good. We're not in the melting pot anymore, which I am very glad I'm not living in the time of the melting pot and that we see ourselves as communities who all have something to give. Now that's easier said than done. It's very difficult to do the work of interfaith relationships, of helping each of us understand where we are, where we have come from.

And we have to find a way of healing past hurts-- the Holocaust is a typical example of that-- and moving forward. And I think that it takes a lot of work. It takes some insightful people. And it takes candor between people, even sometimes where it's difficult and hurtful.

KRISTA TIPPETT: I want to ask you one more question before we finish. Was it your father-in-law who was a Holocaust survivor?

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: Yes, both my in-laws.

KRISTA TIPPETT: Both of your in-laws. So still, for your generation, the Holocaust is a really present reality that is being passed down. And yet, we must be sort of at a turning point where there will be new generations. I mean, for your children, it won't be quite as real as close. How do you think that changes Jewish identity as we move into the 21st century?

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: Well, I thank God every day that my children have had the stories and the connection of their grandparents because they really do understand the Holocaust and connect with it. And it's very present in their lives. It's quite interesting to me.

KRISTA TIPPETT: And how is that a blessing?

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: It's a blessing because the generation of survivors are dying, and soon we won't be able to communicate that historical reality in the same way. And I think that's what I hear under your question is, once all the survivors are gone, how do we communicate memory? You can't in the same way, if it wasn't your own experience. So how do we teach that?

And that, for me, goes back to the Exodus story. Our people have always had the experience of either slavery or anti-Semitism. But we don't dwell there as a community. We dwell at the liberation at the point where we have survived.

And our survival is of the element that's absolutely philosophically, theologically the basis of who we are as a people. And for the following generations who won't have the experience of survivors, it's going to be more difficult to have the heart--

KRISTA TIPPETT: Like your grandchildren.

MARSHA ZIMMERMAN: --and soul. My grandchildren, how are they going to feel about Judaism? How are they going to have that strength to understand what has happened? And that is a question that is unanswered at this point. But it's interesting because I grew up not knowing any survivors.

My parents knew survivors, but I never heard the stories. In the first 10 to 20 years, no one was telling their stories like they are today. It was too painful. But somehow it was communicated to me, how important that event was and how not only chilling it was in our history, but how you must take it on as your own identity.

So it is the ethos of our community. And it always has been because it goes back to a biblical story where we were slaves. But what are we concentrating on around the Seder table for passover? We're talking about our liberation. We're talking about finding the freedom, not only the physical freedom, but ultimately the spiritual freedom of responding and receiving Torah at Sinai.

So it's in our blood, whether we've spoken to somebody directly or not. That is the basis of who we are, because Judaism is a peoplehood, too. It is not only a religion, but we experience everything ourselves.

And again, what the Seder says, what the Haggadah says, it says, you can't just tell the story. You've got to experience the story. You've got to eat matzah for seven days because that's what was eaten in the desert. You have to have bitter herbs to experience the bitterness of slavery. We experience everything. We don't just talk about it. And that, for me, is the power of Judaism.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

DAN OLSON: Marsha Zimmerman, senior rabbi at Temple Israel in Minneapolis. She talked with Minnesota Public Radio's Krista Tippett. You've been listening to Voices of Minnesota on Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Dan Olson.

And if you missed part of our program with Marsha Zimmerman, Sister Gabriel Herbers, and Amal Yusuf, you can hear it again tonight at 9 o'clock during the Midday rebroadcast.

SPEAKER: Programming on Minnesota Public Radio is supported by the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, welcoming Peter Schickele to the Ordway, Wednesday, April 3, for a one-time performance of PDQ Bach originals. Limited tickets available at the spco.org at 651-291-1144

MIKE MULCAHY: And to hear any of our midday broadcasts from the past, go to minnesotapublicradio.org and follow the links for midday in the News section of the website. Also, you might want to check out the Your Voice feature at minnesotapublicradio.org.

Well, that'll do it for Midday today. Midday is produced by Sara Meyer. Rob Schmitz is the assistant producer. Our engineer today was Clifford Bentley. I'm Mike Mulcahy. Have a good Easter. Gary Eichten will be back on Monday.

SPEAKER: On the next All Things Considered, 3,000 Fingerhut employees are adjusting to the news that they'll be out of work by the end of next week. We'll have that story on the next All things Considered weekdays at 3:00 on Minnesota Public Radio. KNOW FM 91.1.

MIKE MULCAHY: You're listening to Minnesota Public Radio. Clear skies. 50 degrees at KNOW FM 91.1. Minneapolis, Saint Paul. It'll be a chance of some showers. This