It was estimated in the Jewish Federation of Greater Portland’s 2023 Community Study that 80 percent of Portland’s Jews are not members of a synagogue or congregation. But everyone needs a rabbi from time to time.

For Portlanders, that rabbi is Rabbi Sarah Rensin, who became Portland’s Jewish community chaplain in 2024. Now, she is launching her own non-profit, Nehamah, to secure the future of chaplaincy services in Portland – and potentially elsewhere.

Nehamah, a name taken from the Hebrew word for “comfort,” focuses on Jewish chaplaincy work – work which is vital to communities around the country but rarely, if anywhere, has its own space, instead supported ad-hoc by family service agencies and federations depending on locale. This arrangement has allowed chaplains to work and serve but has made it difficult for them to advocate for themselves.

“When I talk to [other chaplains,] they’re don’t really want to rock the boat because they’re afraid that they’re going to lose whatever funding or value that the organization they are housed under offers,” Rabbi Rensin said.

Rabbi Rensin is certainly busy enough – with the chaplaincy in Portland geared around serving the unaffiliated, it’s almost as if Rabbi Rensin were serving a congregation of approximately 40,000 members. She’s regularly at area hospitals, visiting patients, or leading groups for those who have lost loved ones. Margueritte Bolles Miller attended one of those groups this summer after the loss of her husband in May.

“[Rabbi Rensin] truly loves what she does; you can see in the way she treats the people and the care that she gives,” Bolles Miller said. “Through her guidance, we found comfort in sharing these moments. She has a give us meaningful assignments about the ones that we’ve lost, and it reminds us to live in the present.”

One of the roles a Jewish community chaplain is often called upon to fill is as an officiant at a funeral. Charlotte Aborn, a non-Jew, was married to an unaffiliated Jewish man who passed away from cancer earlier this year – “he was too young to die,” she said – and she needed someone to officiate his funeral and didn’t want to ask a family member. A call to a Jewish neighbor led her to the Eastside Jewish Commons, and from there to Rabbi Rensin.

“When I met her, I thought, ‘I wish we could have met her when [my husband] was alive,’” Aborn recalled.

Rabbi Rensin led the service and connected Aborn with a grief group. Aborn’s husband wanted his Hebrew name on his grave marker – Rabbi Rensin helped to make sure it was spelled correctly.

“I’m glad she’s starting this nonprofit and has a second person,” Aborn said. “I think they probably need six.”

The second person Aborn referred to is Rabbi Abby Cohen, who is slated to join Nehamah as soon as there is sufficient funding to support the role. Nehamah is fiscally sponsored by Beloved, a Massachusetts non-profit specializing in supporting Jewish organizational startups, and has recruited Rabbi Michael Cahana, Debbie Plawner and Rabbi Eve Posen to its advisory board.

“Rabbi Sarah Rensin brings compassion, knowledge and drive to her role as our community chaplain,” Rabbi Posen said in an email to The Jewish Review. “Rabbi Rensin’s sole focus is on the care of those in need and unaffiliated within the Portland Jewish Community. The priority is visits to those who, for whatever reason are unable to attend or utilize institutional Jewish resources. Rabbi Rensin brings community and Judaism to them. Having this housed at Nehamah as its own endeavor ensures that this necessary service is able to continue for years to come. Rabbi Rensin is an invaluable partner to our work in congregations.”

While Rabbi Rensin is often called upon to be there for those near or at death, or their loved ones, there are also many moments of Jewish life that Rabbi Rensin’s work makes possible. She is a regular visitor to retirement communities around Portland, recognizable in her kippah and known by her title, for holiday services and Shabbat gatherings.

Fara McLaughlin is the Sales Director at Watermark in Portland. A purpose-built retirement community in the Pearl District of Northwest Portland, Watermark’s community is approximately a quarter Jewish.

“Most of these members are no longer necessarily congregationally oriented. The majority aren’t affiliated,” McLaughlin said she discovered when speaking to Jewish community members about how Watermark could support their Judaism. “Mostly, they didn’t want to lose their identity, and they didn’t want to feel they had to hide.”

Thus, Rabbi Rensin has, as she does at other facilities in the area, hosted Passover seders, Chanukah parties and Shabbat dinners at Watermark. McLaughlin, who is Jewish herself, remembers Rabbi Rensin’s first Shabbat at Watermark.

“{Rabbi Rensin] posed a wonderful question, ‘What does Shabbat mean to you?’ I remember one person talking about memories of great grandparents that had come from Germany, survivor stories,” McLaughlin recalled. “There was this evocative place to put memory in the Shabbat, other people there with partners that might have memory impairment, but being able to know that they can light up, literally, when the candles lit. Those are the stories that we’re seeing come out of the relationship we have with the rabbi, and those are priceless.”

Rabbi Rensin is also hosting “Life’s Transitions” at Watermark, a regular group for those who are grieving but also for people adjusting to the changes aging brings – experiences that may not be thought of as grief but often are about moving through loss in the same way.

“It’s, ‘I left my home that I was in for 30 years to come here, and I’m adjusting to what that looks like,’ or ‘my husband, all of his cognitive abilities have changed. He’s going into memory care, and he’s not the person he was, and I feel lonely I feel guilty, and I feel shame that I go out and do things without him,’” Rabbi Rensin gave as examples. “They know it’s every other Tuesday, they know what time it is, and they can pop in when they need it.”

Even beyond the groups and the Shabbats and the High Holiday services she’ll lead at Watermark this year, a first for her in a facility, Rabbi Rensin is a known, consistent, caring presence along Watermark’s hallways – something that gets to the very core of chaplaincy work.

“I’ve seen people go deeper in their spirituality; they’ll say, ‘this means something more to me’” McLaughlin said “[Rabbi Rensin] has really brought the spirit of Judaism to life here.”

An accounting of all the ways Rabbi Rensin touches Jewish life in Portland would be exceedingly long, but all are rooted in the same concept, the concept that gives her new organization its name and brought her to chaplaincy work in the first place – Comfort.

“I just felt like it really encompassed everything that a Jewish Community chaplain does, whether it’s coming to somebody in the hospital or helping to do an interfaith marriage or a holiday service,” Rabbi Rensin said. “Whatever it is, all of that happiness and joy and the sadness and mourning, all of it falls under comfort; the comfort of belonging or the comfort of having someone show up when you need them.”

For more information about Nehama and Rabbi Rensin’s work, visit nehamah.org.