Name: The Blessing of Interfaith Families: How to Make It Work and Thrive
Start: 2025-11-11T18:30:00-05:00
End: 2025-11-11T20:30:00-05:00
Location: Lake Anne Brew House

A rabbi and a minister walk into a bar—no joke! Rabbi Debbie Reichmann and Reverend Samantha Gonzalez-Block, co-clergy of the Interfaith Families Project (IFFP.org), share stories from their work with interfaith couples who are building bridges across faith traditions. Their philosophy? There’s no single “right” way to live an interfaith life—only many paths toward love, joy, and understanding.

Bring your questions about Jewish and Christian faith traditions, your stories, and your open heart for a lively, honest, and hopeful conversation about what makes interfaith relationships not just work, but thrive.

Interfaith Families Project of Greater Washington (IFFP) is an independent community of interfaith people in Rockville, Maryland. Committed to sharing, learning about, and celebrating our Jewish and Christian traditions, IFFP has grown into a vibrant, active community of approximately 300 adults and children, one of the largest interfaith programs in the country. The core value of IFFP is respect – for each other, for Judaism, and for Christianity. The IFFP community includes those who continue to practice a faith, and those who do not. As a community, they celebrate, explore, question, and enjoy both religious traditions equally. IFFP members neither reject their religious backgrounds nor seek a new religion that is a mixture of Christian and Jewish belief. Instead, they believe it is possible – and desirable – to honor our distinct religious traditions and to share those traditions with spouses, partners and children.

Restoration Reston

Jeff Maszal

Leslie

Taproom Theology

Restoration

Religion & Spirituality

Progressive Christian

Human Rights

Social

Singles

Self Exploration

Separation of Church and State

Theology

Beer

Social Justice

Support

The Bible

Interfaith and Intercultural Dialogue

Exploring Christianity

Spiritual Growth

Faith

Michael Graham

Jane

Jared R

Carey Eugene Way

Natalie

Richard 

HerrUban

A life-long learner, **Rabbi Debbie Reichmann** completed her undergraduate and law school studies at Georgetown University and obtained a Master of Public Health from Johns Hopkins School of Public Health.   She returned to school and obtained a Master of Liberal Arts from Georgetown University in August 2016.  Her career includes nearly a decade serving in the health policy arena before transitioning to a programmatic professional role at Georgetown University Department of Campus Ministry working with multi-cultural and interfaith colleagues to support a multi-cultural and interfaith student population with religious offerings for meaningful interfaith interaction.  Ordained in January 2012 from the [Jewish Spiritual Leaders Institute](https://jsli.net/), Rabbi Debbie was trained as a Jewish Universalist rabbi. This formation included learning from Jewish Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist, and Humanist movements. She now blends these teachings to present a modern Jewish worldview that is rooted in tradition but adapted to 21st-century sensibilities while serving the IFFP community.  In her spare time, Rabbi Debbie enjoys time with her family, stone carving, fixing things (preferably with power tools), and indulging her sci-fi/fantasy nerdiness.
**Reverend Samantha Gonzalez-Block** grew up in a multicultural, multilingual, Jewish-Christian home in Montclair, New Jersey. Her passionate desire to wrestle with deep spiritual questions and walk alongside interfaith families led her to major in religion at Barnard College (with a minor in education) and to focus on interfaith engagement while pursuing her Masters of Divinity at [Union Theological Seminary](https://utsnyc.edu/) in New York City. Throughout her career, she has worked in religion, advocacy, and education in the United States and abroad including stints as a middle school teacher in New York City, academic advisor at New York University, advocate for women’s rights in Chile and at the United Nations, and Associate Pastor at Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church in Asheville, North Carolina.  An ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA), Rev. Sam currently serves at the IFFP. She seeks to be a compassionate listener, conversation partner, and cheerleader to interfaith individuals, couples, and families as they discern momentous decisions and navigate spirituality in today’s world.  In her spare time, Rev. Sam loves salsa dance, storytelling, and slam-poetry and spending quality time with her husband, Matt, and their children, Javier and Raquel.

Rabbi Debbie Reichmann and Reverend Samantha Gonzalez-Block

The Blessing of Interfaith Families: How to Make It Work and Thrive

Lake Anne Brew House

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The Blessing of Interfaith Families: How to Make It Work and Thrive

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