Sharon Brous is the senior and founding rabbi of IKAR, a leading-edge Jewish community based in Los Angeles, and author of The Amen Effect: Ancient Wisdom to Heal Our Hearts and Mend Our Broken World, a national bestseller. Brous offered the invocation at the Democratic National Convention in 2024, led the Hanukkah candle lighting with the Vice President and Second Gentleman in 2023, and the White House Passover Seder in 2021. She blessed President Biden and Vice President Harris at the Inaugural National Prayer Service in 2021, and in 2013, she blessed President Obama and Vice President Biden. She was named #1 on the Newsweek/The Daily Beast list of most influential Rabbis in America and has been recognized by The Forward and Jerusalem Post as among the most influential Jews alive today. Her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, and The Washington Post, and her 2016 TED talk, “Reclaiming Religion,” has been viewed by more than 1.5 million people. Brous is in the inaugural cohort of Auburn Seminary‘s Senior Fellows program, which unites top faith leaders working on the frontlines for justice, she sits on the faculty of REBOOT and serves on the International Council of the New Israel Fund and national steering committee for the Poor People’s Campaign. A graduate of Columbia University (both undergraduate and M.A. in Human Rights), she was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary and lives in Los Angeles with her husband and children.