Rabbi Jonah Pesner is the Director of the Presidential Transition and a senior member of the URJ professional staff.  In his new role, he will be helping President-elect Rabbi Rick Jacob's prepare to take office as he develops a renewed vision for the Union. Rabbi Pesner is also the founding Director of Just Congregations. He works with synagogues pursuing social justice across the country and teaches on all three campuses of the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion.  As a congregational rabbi atTempleIsraelinBoston, he pioneered the Fain Award-winning "Ohel Tzedek/Tent of Justice" social action initiative.  He has led efforts to engage thousands of members of congregations to join together in successful campaigns for health care access, affordable housing, public education, gay and lesbian rights, nursing care workers rights, and living wage. As a leader of the Greater Boston Interfaith Organization, Rabbi Pesner was the chair of the GBIO effort in the Massachusetts "Affordable Care Today!" coalition that successfully secured health care for more than half a million uninsured residents of the Commonwealth. Rabbi Pesner chairs the board of the Jewish Organizing Initiative. He has served on the board of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, the Jewish Memorial Hospital in Roxbury, and the Task Force on Congregation-Based Community Organizing of the Jewish Funds for Justice. Rabbi Pesner has written several journal articles, and wrote a chapter entitled "Redemption for Radicals" in the newly published anthology, "Righteous Indignation." He was the Meyer W. Nathans Scholar at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion where he was ordained in 1997. A graduate ofWesleyanUniversity, Rabbi Pesner is married to Boston attorney, Dana S. Gershon. Together they have four daughters, Juliet, Noa, Bobbie and Cate.