David Brooks is an op-ed columnist for The New York Times and appears regularly on PBS NewsHour, NPR’s All Things Considered, and Meet the Press. He is the author of The Road to Character; The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement; Bobos in Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There; and On Paradise Drive: How We Live Now (And Always Have) in the Future Tense. In The Second Mountain, Brooks explores our human relations within our societies — to our families, careers, faith, and community — and how these commitments help us to lead more meaningful lives.
Rabbi Ryan Bauer joined Congregation Emanu-El in 2005 where he has helped create and oversee the community engagement department. He supervises the Preschool and B’nai-Mitzvah program and is nationally recognized for his work with Syrian refugees. Before attending rabbinical school, he studied psychology with an emphasis in Political Economies of Industrialized Societies at the University of California, Berkeley.