Rabbi Barry A. Kenter
Rabbi Barry A. Kenter has been rabbi of the Greenburgh Hebrew Center, Dobbs Ferry, New York since 1984.
A native Californian, he was graduated from California State University at Northridge with a Bachelor of Arts degree in History and a Standard Secondary Teaching Credential. He was a Rotary Foundation Graduate Fellow at the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium where he was awarded both first and second licenses with distinction, the first in Political Science the second in International Relations and comparative Political Science. He holds a Bachelor of Hebrew Literature degree from the University of Judaism and Master of Arts degree from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, which ordained him in 1980. While at the Seminary, he received the Lilliam M. Lowenfield Prize in Practical Theology, the Annie F. Schimmel Memorial Prize and the Rabbi Philip Alstat Prize. Several years ago, Rabbi Kenter returned to the Seminary, where he is in a doctoral program in Medieval Studies.
Following ordination, Rabbi Kenter remained at the Seminary as assistant director of Public Information. Before arriving in Dobbs Ferry, he served as assistant rabbi of Adath Israel Congregation, Downsview, Ontario, Canada. He has served as Jewish Chaplain at Mercy College, is a member of the board of Governors of the New York Board of Rabbis, and was Chairman of the Council of Regional Presidents of the Rabbinical Assembly. A past president of the Westchester-Rockland Rabbinical Assembly, he has been honored by the Jewish Theological Seminary with a Rabbinical Service Award and by the Jewish Education Fund with the Jack Sonkin Memorial Award. He has served on the Dobbs Ferry Youth Council and is active in ecumenical projects throughout Westchester. He is a founding board member of the Center for Jewish-Christian-Muslim Understanding, Irvington, N.Y. and a member of the Board of Trustees of the Community Hospital at Dobbs Ferry. In February 1999 he was asked by the World Council of Synagogues to serve as a weekend rabbi-in-residence for a newly-created Conservative congregation in Nice, France.
Rabbi Kenter and his wife, Judith Dickstein Kenter, are the parents of two sons, one of whom is studying for the rabbinate the Jewish Theological Seminary, while his brother continues his studies at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. Judi, a past-president of the Hudson Valley Branch of Women’s League for Conservative Judaism, presently serves as International Recording Secretary for Women’s League for Conservative Judaism.