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Jews Around The World Celebrate Yom Kippur

Tuesday night, observant Jews around the world attended Kol Nidrei, the evening service which marked the start of Yom Kippur.  Yom Kippur, the holiest of Jewish holidays, is the Day of Atonement.

Yom Kippur is the last of the 10-day period when Jews pray that they will be written into the Book of Life for another year. They also ask for forgiveness from family and friends. 

Yom Kippur is a solemn holiday, unlike Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year which was 10 days ago. For Yom Kippur, Jews who are able, fast from sundown to sundown.   This evening they will have a Break Fast, a dairy meal. They'll feast on bagels, cream cheese and lox, smoked fish, deviled eggs, cheeses, black bottoms and other desserts. 

The most important mitzvot, or commandment, a Jew must fulfill is to hear the shofar, or ram's horn, blowing on the holiday. It signifies that Jews are now freed from their sins.  It’s also is a symbol of the ascent of God. 

A core Jewish belief is that one must ask questions, so the holiday means different things to different people and families have their own customs. 

Throughout more than 5,000 years of asking questions, more than 100 branches and sects of Judaism have arisen. Each has its own variation of beliefs and traditions and this holds true on Yom Kippur as well. 

Louisa Jonas is an independent public radio producer, environmental writer, and radio production teacher based in Baltimore. She is thrilled to have been a PRX STEM Story Project recipient for which she produced a piece about periodical cicadas. Her work includes documentaries about spawning horseshoe crabs and migratory shorebirds aired on NPR's Weekend All Things Considered. Louisa previously worked as the podcast producer at WYPR 88.1FM in Baltimore. There she created and produced two documentary podcast series: Natural Maryland and Ascending: Baltimore School for the Arts. The Nature Conservancy selected her documentaries for their podcast Nature Stories. She has also produced for the Chemical Heritage Foundation’s Distillations Podcast. Louisa is editor of the book Backyard Carolina: Two Decades of Public Radio Commentary. She holds an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from University of North Carolina Wilmington. Her training also includes journalism fellowships from the Science Literacy Project and the Knight Digital Media Center, both in Berkeley, CA. Most recently she received a journalism fellowship through Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution where she traveled to Toolik Field Station in Arctic Alaska to study climate change. In addition to her work as an independent producer, she teaches radio production classes at Howard Community College to a great group of budding journalists. She has worked as an environmental educator and canoe instructor but has yet to convince a great blue heron to squawk for her microphone…she remains undeterred.