Executive Board
Who We Are
Maneck Bhjuwala
President
Maneck Bhujwala was born in Bombay, India and came to the United States in 1965 as a graduate student. He has Master’s degrees in Engineering, Business Administration, and Interfaith Action. He worked as engineer and manager for many high-tech companies in California, including on a NASA project. He co-founded two Zarathushti (Zoroastrian) organizations, and served on their Boards. Currently he is Overseas Director of the World Zoroastrian Organization U.K., and serves as a volunteer priest. He has been with the Greater Huntington Beach Interfaith Council (GHBIC) since 2005 and served on its executive committee. He currently also serves on the Boards of Orange County Interfaith Network, and North American Interfaith Network, on the Administrative Committee of the Center for Religion, Loma Linda University, and on the Advisory Council of The Guibord Center, Los Angeles. He also gives talks at schools, colleges, churches, interfaith organizations, radio and TV, and Parliament of World Religions.
Jynene Johnson
Vice President
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Convert to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
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Wife to Larry M. Johnson https://www.facebook.com/larryjynene.johnson
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Mom of 6 (3+3), Mimi to 18 https://www.instagram.com/jyneneann/
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Former professional dancer and choreographer
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Israel travel director for 30 years
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Religious teacher and leader
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Love to sew and DIY
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Home Entertaining
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Oregon raised
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Museum lover
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List maker
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BYU alumni
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Dream to be with my family forever!
Marsha Rechsteiner
Secretary
Marsha has been a member of the Greater Huntington Beach Interfaith Council since 2014. She has been an active member of the Sts Simon and Jude Catholic Community. She has served there in numerous Leadership roles over the last 25 years. She continues to be very involved in the annual Community Service Day sponsored by GHBIC. She has also served as President of GHBIC 2018-2020
Marsha and her husband Brian (Retired Board of Trustee for the HB City School District for 24 years) were both very active, in the Huntington Beach School Districts, both Elementary and High School. Marsha still works as an Educational Consultant for Chancy and Bruce Educational Resources. Marsha and Brian have been married since 1973. They have 2 married children, Julie and Erik, as well as 2 granddaughters and 1 grandson.
Emrah Erduran
Muslim Community
Emrah Erduran is the Community Liaison of Pacifica Institute. He taught Math in Middle schools and High schools and worked as a school administrator. Currently, he is a small business owner. He has been living in Huntington Beach since 2012 with his wife and two kids. He dedicates to serve to the community by volunteering for several organizations. He has served the Silk Road Festival organizing committee, GHBIC’s Community Service Day, and 4th of July Parade committees. He is dedicated to interfaith and intercultural dialog. He organized several luncheons, seminars, talk series and forums. During the month of Ramadan, he has been organizing Iftar dinners with various faith groups. He is a member of Orange County Sherriff’s Department Interfaith Advisory Council and The United Nations Association of Orange County (UNA-OC).
Charlie Neiderman
Emeritus Past President
Temple Beth David - Council member highlight: Charlie Niederman. Charlie was born in 1935 during the Depression in Connecticut and belonged to the only Jewish family in his small town, where antisemitism was freely expressed. He remembers being chased and called names at his two-room school. His family was secular, gas rationing prohibited him from traveling to the nearest synagogue, and he did not receive Bar Mizvah training until he was in the Coast Guard. He and his wife Kathy took training in Judaism when she converted.
After retiring from the Coast Guard in 1985, they joined Temple Beth David and a decade later, joined the Greater Huntington Beach Interfaith Council when it was formed. He has participated in and lead the Jewish Chautauqua Society and attended a conference at the Vatican and had an audience with Pope Benedict.
He has attended five World Union for Progressive Judaism Conferences, and at the one in South America he met Rabbis from Buenos Aires who spoke of how much they liked working with Pope Francis when the Pope was Bishop, and he continues to lead the GHBIC Walking Together program, which joins 4th, 5th, and 6th grade students from Muslim, Christian and Jewish families together to get to know each other and learn from each other.
Pattie Mercado
Member at Large
Reverend Pattie Mercado joined the GHBIC when she was called to serve as the Spiritual Director at the Huntington Beach Center for Spiritual Living in February 2019. Pattie and her husband of 34 years have 2 adult children and share a strong commitment to serve their spiritual community together. For the past 20 years Patie has participated as a leader, collaborator, and participant with local and global organizations to bring forward a greater conversation and experience of individual value and collective unity.
Rabbi Stephen Einstein
Member at Large
Stephen J. Einstein was born and reared in Southern California, and is a cum laude-Phi Beta Kappa graduate of UCLA. He was ordained at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, where he also earned his doctorate. Mentor to many rabbinical students, in recognition of his years of service, the College-Institute also awarded him an honorary doctorate.
Rabbi Einstein served congregations in Parsippany, New Jersey and Westminster, California, prior to founding Congregation B’nai Tzedek, Fountain Valley, California in 1976. He remained the synagogue’s rabbi until his retirement in 2012. He is now Founding Rabbi Emeritus.
Rabbi Einstein was Vice President of Member Services of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, having previously served for 12 years on the Conference’s Ethics Committee, 6 years as Chair. He is Past President of the Pacific Association of Reform Rabbis, the Orange County Board of Rabbis, and the Orange County Bureau of Jewish Education. He is currently on the Board of CSP (Community Scholar Program) and the Anti-Defamation League. He was the recipient of the American Jewish Committee’s Micah Award for Human Relations, and in 2014, Orange County Human Relations tendered him their Legacy Award.
He taught Orange County’s Community-wide Introduction to Judaism class from 1976 to 2017. He is co-editor of Introduction to Judaism: A Sourcebook, which was used in basic Judaism courses throughout North America for over three decades. He is also co-author of Every Person’s Guide to Judaism. For over two decades, he served as Co-chair of Reform Judaism’s Commission on Outreach, Membership, and Sacred Community. Dr. Einstein has taught at California State University, Fullerton in the Department of Comparative Religion.
Active in interfaith affairs, he is Past President (and current Board member) of the Greater Huntington Beach Interfaith Council, served on the Interfaith Advisory Committee of the Alzheimer’s Association, and is an active member of the Catholic-Jewish Dialogue. He is on the Board of CLUE (Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice) and is a volunteer Chaplain for the Fountain Valley Police Department. For three years, he served as Chair of the Governing Board of Fountain Valley Regional Hospital. A prior School Board Trustee, he was a member of the Personnel Commission of the Fountain Valley School District from 1990-2017. He now serves on the Board of the Fountain Valley Schools Foundation.. He represents the 72nd Assembly District on the Central Committee of the California Democratic Party. Rabbi Einstein is listed in Who’s Who in America.
Rabbi Einstein and his wife Robin reside in Fountain Valley and are the proud parents of four children and seven grandchildren.
Kelly Frankiewicz
Member at Large
Kelly Frankiewicz, a cradle Episcopalian, was raised world wide as the daughter of a US Airforce Officer. Her BA in Art is from Oberlin College, Ohio where she met and married her petroleum engineer husband in 1967. They have 2 daughters, 2 Sons in Law, and 5 amazing grandchildren. Kelly taught upper division Mathematics at Mater Dei HS, Santa Ana, CA, 87-95. Led and lectured for Bible Study Fellowship International (BSF) 9 years, then entered Seminary, receiving the Master of Divinity degree from Fuller Theological, Pasadena in 2010 with classes at Dallas Theological, Houston, and Talbot School of Theology, La Mirada. Throughout the past 15 years she has served under 5 Methodist Pastors, preaching as needed 5-6 times a year. Since 2016 she has developed her repertoire of acrylic on canvas paintings, often showing at the HB Art Center and other CA galleries. Since 2017, Kelly has volunteered with the American Red Cross as a Shelter Supervisor, Disaster Spiritual Care provider, and a Blood Drive Ambassador. Kelly has been active in the GHBIC since 2009.
Kelly is currently serving at Leisure World, Community United Methodist Church Seal Beach.
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Christina Hernandez
Member at Large
Christy Hernandez is the Executive Director of Dance 4 Joy Ministries, a non-profit dance ministry & studio in Costa Mesa and Irvine CA that serves in communities, churches, and schools in the US and abroad training up the next generation to proclaim the Gospel in the art of dance. She is a professional tap dancer, master teacher, choreographer and producer in Southern California, holding a BA in Creative Arts and Dance from San Jose State University (SJSU) and a teaching credential in Elementary Education from California State University Fullerton. Christy has also been the Director/Instructor of Tap Dance at the Academy of the Performing Arts @ Huntington Beach High School for the last seventeen years, an invited facilitator of dance at the Dancer In Me Sacred Arts and Music Training Institute for the last six years, and a resident director of liturgical dance ministry in Orange County CA for the last five years.
