Diane Joy Schmidt, at The Blogs

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Apr 15, 2024, 8:09 AM

The Fifth Question

Iran’s unsuccessful missile attack on Israel Saturday night had us holding our breath. Now we are taking another breath and hoping for no further escalations. At this critical time, I'm so proud of President Biden for calling for restraint....

Sep 24, 2023, 8:26 AM

Coyote tosses the stars and why AI can’t help us

Coyote chases the moon, or why AI won't have the answers we'll need

On days when I stare at screens for too long, reality loses some of its texture, and the computer won't ask what's missing from my experience

Aug 3, 2023, 6:12 AM

What’s the big deal about hate violence?

A jury decided today, August 2, 2023, that the shooter in the Tree of Life Synagogue massacre in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania should be put to death. I recall the enormous international outcry when the shooting happened in 2018, and a...

Apr 9, 2023, 9:45 AM

We are called to do more

It’s Passover again, beginning at the full moon of the springtime lunar month of Nisan in the Hebrew calendar, and my apple tree usually blossoms now, though this year it seems to be a little late. Passover often falls...

Apr 19, 2022, 7:16 PM

Passover is the practice of liberation

At five years old I rolled under the table with laughter at Passover after my thimble-full of wine. Passover was a time our family really enjoyed themselves together. And what always struck me as a novel passage in the...

Jan 16, 2017, 11:10 AM

Religions around the world have an eschatology, a story about how things end – Zoroastrians, Jews, Christians and Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists and prophecies among Native Americans. They include a vision of a great spiritual and peaceful time, and...

Jan 8, 2017, 11:30 PM

Swastika graffiti on University of New Mexico campus: How headlines got it wrong, and why it matters

What happened, what really happened. Sometime late in the night after the election, graffiti artists expressed their pleasure with Trump’s win by spraying graffiti with the words Sieg Heil (Hail, Victory!) and Trump and a swastika on a storefront in...

Dec 24, 2016, 11:29 AM

The First Shall Be Last – One for the Money

The forces of light and darkness are fighting for control of the soul of Donald Trump. Suddenly overnight, Trump seems to have turned into a beacon of light to Jews, after getting Egypt to withdraw their UN resolution on...

Dec 21, 2016, 10:34 PM

Trump, the Religious

Events are moving so quickly. We all want understand what happened on Nov. 8th when Trump won the election, what to make of what is happening right now with his top staff and cabinet picks, and what is going...

Oct 16, 2016, 10:20 AM

A Story for a Happier Ending and for Sukkot

Once upon a time there was a rock squirrel named Jacqueline that lived in the desert and was very happy. Jacqueline collected seeds and mesquite beans and cactus fruit and before the winter came she stored Pinon nuts. She...

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About Me

Diane Joy Schmidt, publisher and editor of the new, independent, online, state-wide New Mexico Jewish Journal which launched in March of 2024, has been a regular correspondent and columnist since 2008 for the New Mexico Jewish Link (now closed), the Gallup Independent, the Navajo Times and a contributor to the Chicago Tribune, Tikkun, Lilith, Hadassah Magazine, and the Intermountain Jewish News. Her columns and articles have received seven Rockower Awards from the American Jewish Press Association in seven years as well as first place awards from the Society of Professional Journalists, the Arizona Press Association, the Native American Journalists Association, and the National Federation of Press Women. She grew up on Chicago's North Shore in the traditions of Reform Judaism, is anchored by her memories of the fireflies at Union Institute camp and the Big Dipper over Lake Michigan, and is an admirer of all things spiritually resonant.