Rabbi G.

Rabbi Elimelech Goldberg (lovingly known by thousands of children as Rabbi G.), is the founder and director of Kids Kicking Cancer, a nonprofit organization that teaches martial arts to children battling cancer as well as to those facing other serious challenges in their lives. The therapy techniques he has developed, using meditation and breathing exercises, have been very successful in decreasing the pain of pediatric patients. Rabbi Goldberg began the program in 1999, nearly eighteen years after losing his first child to leukemia. He holds a First Degree Black Belt in the Korean art of Choi Kwang Do as well as a clinical assistant professorship in pediatrics at the Wayne State University School of Medicine in Detroit.

Among many honors and commendations, Rabbi G. was awarded the 2004 Robert Wood Johnson Community Health Leaders Award, the nation's most prestigious honor in community public health, and in the same year he was the recipient of the Humanitarian of the Year Award from the McCarty Cancer Foundation. In 2012 he was featured in People magazine's "Heroes Among Us" page, and in 2014 he was named a “Top Ten CNN Hero.”

Rabbi Goldberg received his rabbinical ordination from Yeshiva University, where he also graduated summa cum laude. He served for twenty years as a pulpit rabbi and police chaplain in Southfield, Michigan. He now lectures around the world on the subjects of spirituality and health, and has expanded Kids Kicking Cancer to Canada, Italy, and Israel. In addition to helping children deal with serious health challenges in their lives, Rabbi G. also conducts stress seminars at Fortune 500 companies, where 97% of adult participants have described the presentations as having had "a profound influence" on their lives.

Rabbi G. and his wife, Ruthie, have two married children and eight grandchildren.