Kehilla Legacies

In an eJewish Philanthropy blog post yesterday, Are there too many Congregations? Debunking a "Polite Fiction,"  Rabbi Aaron Bisno, from Rodef Shalom Congregation in Pittsburgh, comments on the question of whether or not there are too many congregations. His thoughtful response is that we need to ask a different question: “Ask rather, how collaborative and creative, our thinking?”

Rabbi Bisno encourages our synagogue leaders to change the mindset of competition with their neighbors.  And, as he argued in an earlier post, we will all have to learn how to have “courageous conversations” where we discuss challenging and difficult realities rather than avoid them until it’s too late.

Rabbi Bisno calls for congregational leaders to enter into dialogue that focuses on community rather than their own congregations:

Clearly, the most important work and biggest tasks we have before us can only be accomplished by our all working as partners across, within and between the traditional lines. The old way of thinking about our work is yesterday’s news.

This not only holds true for synagogue leaders; it will need to be true for Jewish organizations, as well.

Coincidentally, it is the Pittsburgh area where courageous conversations are being convened in August by a new collaboration that brings together the Conservative and Reform movements and Jewish Federations, sparked by the Jewish Community Legacy Project.

The Jewish Community Legacy Project works with small synagogues in communities with declining or changing populations. JCLP’s executive director, David Sarnat, is eloquent in describing congregations he has worked with that look beyond the bricks and mortar of their synagogue buildings and cemeteries. They courageously plan for a quality of Jewish life for their remaining members, and they archive the history of their communities while establishing a legacy that benefits the greater Jewish community through the disposition of their buildings and assets. They set up scholarships for Jewish youth to attend college, donate Torahs to burgeoning communities, or support new Jewish educational programs.

JCLP has identified nearly 100 small synagogue communities across the country of all denominations that fit their criteria for declining or changing communities: fewer than 75 members, member age rising, consistent reduction in membership over a period of at least five years, demographic data that does not predict growth in the Jewish community.

David’s vision is for these communities to be proactive and intentional about their legacies. With guidance and support from the entire Jewish organizational spectrum – and this is where the movements and Federation come in – their legacies can build the foundation for emerging Jewish communities in the 21^st Century.

So on August 26, The United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, Union for Reform Judaism, Jewish Federations of North America and Jewish Community Legacy Project will convene a courageous conversation for very small synagogue communities: the conference, Congregations in a Changing Environment. 

Hosted by the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh, we will look at how we view growth, stability, and quality of life in very small communities. We’ll explore how to focus energy towards the people remaining in a community, and beyond the preservation of buildings, stained glass windows and plaques.  

We expect that a number of the participants at the conference will be steadfast about the stability of their communities. We hope they will begin to think about ways to share or collaborate with their neighbors to continue the quality of their Jewish lives. We expect that we will also motivate others to take a realistic look at their futures, begin a relationship with Jewish Community Legacy Project, and accept help and support from their movement and Federation.

This conference is the beginning of a partnership that will continue nationwide. As the work expands, we expect to find kehilla - sacred community - across the generations as declining communities create legacies that support new ones, and, as JCLP says, “assure that the past has a place in the future.”  

Traditionalists

I stand at the reader’s table with a yad in my hand, ready to read Torah for the first time. The gabbai is a woman named Amy, whose lilting voice I have heard reading Torah or Haftarah almost every week for the months that I have been a member at Ohev Shalom in Wallingford, Pennsylvania. She smiles and whispers in my ear that I’ll do great, her hand gently resting on my shoulder until the blessings are said and I open the Torah to begin. I can’t remember if I made a mistake or not. I only remember Amy’s calm presence and big hug afterwards.

For the next four years, we would be part of a small team of people who did a lot of Torah reading. Small and medium-sized communities can go through “all hands on deck” periods where there are very few volunteers to keep ritual life going.  My years at Ohev challenged me to step up continually, and, at the same time, was the single most supportive environment for me to learn and grow Jewishly. My friendship with Amy and many other “Ohevites” continues, even though I have moved out of the community.

I asked Amy how she learned to read Torah and Haftarah, and where she got that steady presence on the bima. Her answer was immediate: “My father was my Haftarah teacher and my role model.”

This year I had the chance to work on a project with her father, Dick Wissoker. As a volunteer on United Synagogue’s Israel Commission, Dick was part of the committee that made decisions about grants for Israel education and advocacy. When he visited Amy this weekend for Father’s Day, he asked if we could meet in person.  

It turns out that Amy’s role models are both of her parents, Dick and Barbara Wissoker. As we chatted on Amy’s sun porch, they told me the story of their Jewish journeys, beginning as children in New Rochelle, NY, winding their way through the Midwest, and landing in Lexington, MA.  

They have always been volunteers. Barbara said that she told Dick when they moved to St. Louis that if they were going to join a synagogue they had to be active. “There’s no use belonging if you can’t contribute something,” she said. So Dick held leadership positions on committees and the board while Barbara became board secretary. She laughed at the memory of board meetings, “that lasted until 1:00 a.m., with cigar smoke so thick that you had to hang out your clothes in the fresh air when you got home.”

Their story wraps around and through the history of Conservative Judaism in the mid to late 20^th century. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel taught and prayed at their shul in New Rochelle when they were young. They recall the move to egalitarianism and the effect on their four children. Amy’s bat mitzvah was the last one in the community where girls were confined to Friday night services while boys held the Saturday morning slots.

Dick still leads services regularly at Temple Emunah in Lexington, MA, and he and Barbara admire the new generation of rabbis who lead their kehilla. On her iPad, Barbara shows me the weekly YouTube videos that Rabbi David Lerner and Rabbi Michael Fel produce, sent out to the congregational listserve. They are fun, engaging, and community-building in a way that Barbara and Dick never imagined in their younger years.

Much has been said and written about Barbara and Dick’s age group, the “traditionalists.” Their generational portrait is marked by the feeling of responsibility. They joined congregations, they built synagogue buildings, volunteered on committees and showed up when they were called to help. They found kehilla from belonging and supporting.

In Barbara and Dick’s family, their Jewish legacy continues in their baby boomer children and grandchildren. Their example of kehilla leadership lives on in Amy. Like her mother, Amy volunteered to be recording secretary for Ohev Shalom’s board. Like her father, she leads services, reads Torah and Haftarah, serves as gabbai.


And now she is in line to be president.

Sacred community among strangers

A significant part of my job involves being locked away in a hotel or conference center with groups of people. In the last nine months, I have been on two retreats with a total of 60 United Synagogue staff, at a Kallah with about 200 kehilla leaders, staff and vendors, one retreat with our board of directors, and two Shabbatons with a total of 52 kehilla presidents. I just returned from three days of business and planning meetings with United Synagogue and local lay leaders in Detroit. Although it doesn't come close to what cruise ship staff might log in with passengers for the year, it does add up to more than 500 hours with about 380 people.


Besides lack of fresh air and sunshine, and eating too many unhealthy snacks, there is something that happens to people when they stay together for several days.


After the habitual blackberry and cell phone checking, the group eventually eases in to a relaxed rhythm when they realize that they're not going anywhere for awhile. Bonding happens quickly, especially in a well orchestrated program like Sulam for Presidents, an intensive training for new and incoming synagogue presidents.


It takes time to get comfortable in a new space with strangers. It takes even more time to filter out our normal distractions and bring our whole attention into the room. That's why facilitators spend so much energy designing creative opening exercises. But the real shift towards being a cohesive group at Sulam happens when we stop for mincha.


Most of us are unaccustomed to interrupting our business meetings or classes for prayer. Yet just as Sulam participants finish the orientation exercises and settle in for serious learning, they are handed prayer books and told it's time to daven. I watch them mentally and physically shift gears, remembering that this is a Jewish retreat, and realizing that in addition to bathroom and noshing breaks, prayer breaks will be on the agenda.


We begin their first mincha service with a meditation on how we will spend our days together as a group. At this point, they don't know that there will be many more prayer breaks -  three times a day, with birkat ha mazon after every meal, Shabbat services, text study, a rabbi's tisch on Friday night. We'll be on Jewish time for three days, and we'll track the time through prayer services.


In two days, they will complain that rather than prayer punctuating the learning, it feels like the learning punctuates the endless prayer.


But something will happen to everyone on retreat, despite the occasional kvetching. At some point, someone will try something he or she never tried before. A woman might wear a tallit, or someone will put on tefillin, for the first time. One person, terrified of making mistakes reading Torah, will get hearty cheers and support. Someone else will give a dvar Torah, or lead a verse of prayer in Hebrew even if he can't read it for real.


Almost everyone at the retreat will find a moment when they experience prayer in a way that they never did in their synagogues at home. By the last day, they will wish they could have one more Shabbat together.


One Sulam president wrote to us:

"I thought it would be a weekend of seminars, learning experiences and practical business type seminars designed to help me in my leadership roles...But I wasn't anticipating the intensity of when you package it all with prayer with a group of equally committed individuals. The whole package was intense, spiritual and emotional in a good way."

We begin our retreats as a circle of individuals. We end our retreats as a kehilla - sacred community.

Operation Tent of Abraham and Sarah

On the second day of his walk across America, Pastor Corey Brooks and 10 companions were welcomed at Congregation Ahavas Shalom in Newark, NJ, by their president, Eric Freedman, as the first stop on United Synagogue's Operation Tent of Abraham and Sarah.

After a longed-for rest and the first kosher meal of their lives, Pastor Brooks and his team were taken upstairs to the sanctuary. Eric told the history of Ahavas Shalom, as the longest operating synagogue in Newark, and the special story of the beautiful wood ark that originated in a Reform temple, Rodeph Shalom. Then they had a special experience with Torah.

Pastor Brooks' son, Corey, walked to a Torah scroll that was placed on a table. Rabbi Rozenwasser encouraged him to open it, and, to their surprise, Corey turned to the first line of Parshat Re'eh, Deut. 11:26, "Behold, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse."


Eliseo read the Hebrew to the group, and translated it to English. "How perfect for you on this day," he said. "Through your walk, by example, you're asking others to choose life as well."


Pastor Brooks and his group are in New Brunswick, NJ, heading to Philadelphia, where they will be welcomed by more Conservative kehillot. They are finding kehilla on their way.

Kehilla is a verb.

Ok, technically, in Hebrew kehilla means "community" or "sacred community." It is not a verb; it's a noun.


But what defines community? If I am trying to find sacred community, how do I know when I'm there?

Three kehillot:

Lexington, KY - It's the centennial of Ohavay Zion Synagogue. Hundreds of people are in the sanctuary on Friday night who have come from all over the country to celebrate and re-connect with old friends. They will be there again on Saturday morning, and then spend the entire weekend in carefully orchestrated events that accentuate the unique history of the community. Sunday's breakfast, in the restaurant on the site of the original synagogue building, has the hot buffet on the former bima.  

Every person I talk to is eager to tell me how OZS is different. On my walk to shul on Saturday, my companion tells me about the houses we're passing, and the community event they had years ago. OZS had an open house tour to illustrate Jewish holidays, each home displaying the finest tables set for Rosh Hashana, Passover or Chanuka, one home with a sukkah. Each host welcomed visitors and explained Jewish customs for the holiday. Hundreds of people from the community came out, some on buses. The majority were not Jewish, and the OZS members were delighted to show and share the sacred in their lives with their Christian neighbors. 

New York, NY - On Friday night at Park Avenue Synagogue, the four clergy sit on stools on the bima facing the congregation, Rabbis Cosgrove and Rein on the left, Cantors Schwartz and Kidron on the right. The music of the two cantors fills the Kabbalat Shabbat service and elevates those of us who sing along. The next morning, Cantor is accompanied by a choir and full orchestra synthesizer. There is less congregational participation, but, rather, an experience of divine sound - the angelic tenor of a masterful young Cantor blending the ancient with the present.   

Newark, NJ or Palatine, IL - About 30 incoming or new synagogue presidents are on retreat at Sulam for Presidents. They have taken two days off from work to spend from Thursday until Sunday together. We have a schedule that goes like this: Learn, Pray, Eat... Pray, Learn, Eat, Pray, Eat, Drink... Pray, eat, pray, pray, eat, learn, pray, drink, laugh.... Pray, learn...Say goodbye. 

They will learn about mission, vision, values, budgets, and other things that anyone can read in a book. They will share with each other their best ideas, their stories and fears about being president. They will pray so much that they will say things like, "I would never be able to let my rabbi run services so long on Saturday morning." And at the end of the retreat, they will say that they have never had an experience of sacred community like this before.

So where do I find sacred community? Not in a place or a building. I find sacred community in relationships. It's in intentions - best intentions and even failed intentions - to connect human to human and human to divine. I find sacred community with experiences that connect the ancient with me now. It only happens when we act. When we connect through prayer and music, celebrate together, when we visit the sick, comfort a mourner, notice when someone loses a job or a friend. I find kehilla in action. Kehilla as a verb.

Sacred steps

Today I walked six miles with a man who plans to walk 3,000 miles. I heard his story for the first time from Rabbi Michael Siegel, senior rabbi at Anshe Emet in Chicago. He described a pastor whose community was so affected by gun violence that shots were fired during a funeral at his church from the motel across the street. Pastor Corey Brooks took to the roof of the motel in November 2011, and stayed there through the Chicago winter until February, when he raised enough money to buy the property. He will walk across America to raise awareness and money to build a community center on the site to turn a place of violence into a place of peace.


So why did the chief kehilla officer of United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism walk with him?


Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel walked arm in arm with Dr. Martin Luther King in Selma during the civil rights movement. Heschel is quoted as saying, "“I pray with my feet. For many of us the march from Selma to Montgomery was about protest and prayer. Legs are not lips, and walking is not kneeling. And yet our legs uttered songs. Even without words, our march was worship. I felt my legs were praying.”


Almost 50 years later, another minister is walking to wake people up about a scourge of violence, with tee shirts that say, "Praying with my feet."  This time, a community can walk with him.


United Synagogue supports what Pastor Brooks is doing. With the name, "Operation Tent of Sarah and Abraham," we're envisioning Conservative kehillot, (sacred communities), opening up their doors for him to stop, going out to meet him as he passes by, or walking with him to raise the funds to build his place of peace. Rabbi Siegel sat with him during the winter on the roof, studied the bible with him, and views this as a way to re-energize the relationship between blacks and Jews.


Pastor Brooks is a huge man with a soft voice. He began his walk across America at Times Square, and his first stop was at United Synagogue. Rabbi Steven Wernick, CEO of United Synagogue, Rabbi Siegel, United Synagogue staff, and about 50 others accompanied Pastor Brooks on his first day of travel. He expects to cross the George Washington Bridge today, and be in Newark, NJ, tomorrow. Philadelphia after that, then Pittsburgh, then the midwest, to California. There are a lot of miles in between.


So I walked with him to Harlem. I took a cab back.