Finding Kehilla on the Road

I have written before about how much of my time is spent on retreat with people, and how quickly community can be created among strangers. I have just come back from two months of traveling and retreat-ing with groups from Boca Raton to Toronto. I've been in Baltimore, MD, Birmingham, AL, Atlanta, Harrisburg, PA, West Palm Beach, Jacksonville, FL, and Canada, meeting with people, leading a Sacred Strategies conference, and on retreat at Sulam for Presidents.

Here's what I found out.

1. Conservative Judaism has six generations under one roof. In addition to the usual five age-based demographics that we talk about - (Traditionalists, Baby Boomers, and Generations X, Y and Z) - we have another one that crosses almost all boundaries: the "Camp" generation. USY and Camp Ramah have created a shared experience that is as powerful as the cultural and political dynamics that molded people based on the time period in which they grew up. Camp created peak Jewish moments, connections, relationships and pure joy that former campers yearn to find in their congregations, but can't.

The retreat experience rekindles that spirit. Here's an example of a spontaneous eruption of celebration on Saturday night at Sulam for Presidents as we ended two long days of learning, prayer, reflection and bonding and realized we had to leave the next day.

2. Peak Jewish experiences don't just happen. Every group is different and a meaningful moment for one person or group might never be repeated with others.

Here is an example: Our closing ceremony for Sulam for Presidents has two simple components. Before we say tefillat ha derech, the prayer for travel, participants are asked to say how they have changed during the weekend. A tallit is passed from one president to the next, and when it's your turn to speak, you wear the tallit. The symbolism in the moment is that this tallit has been passed from president to president in every Sulam program for several years, and when it is on your shoulders, you are the next in a line of hundreds that have worn it before you. The tallit wraps one person, but no Sulam president is alone.

One year, our group included two women who had never worn a tallit before. Moving into the presidency of their synagogues was adding weight to their decision about whether or not they would begin this mitzvah. They realized during the tallit ceremony at Sulam that this was the moment when they would make that change in their practice and identity. They asked if they could pass the tallit to each other, and the group shehecheyanu was said with tears of supportive joy.

Knowing that we can't force inspiration, spirituality or meaning, we have only one rule at any of our retreats:

The "recipe" for every day must have three ingredients, the same that are the foundation of our kehillot: Learning, Worship and Community. 

3. Our new kehilla presidents don't need to be taught about Generation X. They are Gen X. Fourteen of the 40 presidents at our Sulam retreat were between the ages of 33 and 45, and their eyes are wide open. During a large group conversation about change that led to mentioning sisterhoods and men's clubs in synagogues, one 43-year old president said, "Women my age smoke cigars and men my age like to cook. How will our Sisterhood and Men's Club adjust to that?"

4. Collaboration, mergers, sharing space, and sharing staff are going to be considered signs of visioning and planning, rather than foretelling the doom of a community. From the growing community of young families in Congregation Shaarei Kodesh in West Palm Beach, using a small space as their base and renting a large space during High Holidays, to Beit Reyim Synagogue in Ontario that has moved into the Jewish Community Campus, leaders are looking at their vision of 21st Century community first, rather than how to sustain buildings from the 19th and 20th Centuries.

In the last two months, I didn't find much support for the tired narrative of the decline of the Conservative movement. Instead, I saw how Conservative Judaism, born 100 years ago in North America during a time of unprecedented change, gives us the framework for continually creating meaningful Jewish identity and experience. There are signs of fresh thinking, fearlessness and a commitment from a new generation of leaders whose shared experience will build the Jewish community of tomorrow.

Presenteeism

An article in the January/February issue of Harvard Business Review, The Third Wave of Virtual Work, by Lynda Gratton, outlines the three waves of change that technology created in patterns of workplace relationships and collaboration. The first wave began with easily accessible personal computers and email capability, and allowed entrepreneurs and free spirits to work from home. Mobile technology created the second wave, as corporate employees, enabled to work from anywhere and at anytime, moved out of the physical spaces that used to be required to house bulky and expensive equipment. According to Gratton, it is predicted that more than 1.3 billion people will be working remotely within a few years.

But working remotely can feel like working alone. The friendly familiarity, collaboration and water cooler connecting that used to be possible when people shared the same physical spaces aren't naturally occurring in our new virtual workplace environments.

The third wave, happening now, is a response to isolation. A new dynamic is emerging, creating "urban hubs"- physical spaces that remote workers can share. Urban hubs give remote workers a place to go, (instead of the local coffee shop), for well-designed workspaces, meeting areas and current technology. What's different about this than the old office building model? It's down the street from your home and you're not necessarily sharing space with people from your company.

It can be argued, and it has been, that productivity wasn't guaranteed when people were expected to show up to work in offices together. The term, "presenteeism," was coined at first to describe the phenomenon of people coming to work sick just to be counted as present. The word has expanded to mean the erroneous expectation that showing up for eight hours to an office space with your colleagues will guarantee that something meaningful will emerge.

Urban hubs offer a new take on the rationale for workers inhabiting a physical space. Rather than grouping people according to their corporate affiliation, a work space becomes the hub of activity based on shared interests and objectives. Gratton describes a membership-based Tech Shop in California that provides space for novice inventors, with shared tools and equipment, populated by local creative people supporting one another. She predicts outcomes from the more than 2,000 - and growing - co-working spaces around the globe:

When hubs serve particular communities, they tend to take on distinct cultures, which can translate into varying terms of use. They can also become hotbeds of talent where techniques, contacts and passions are shared, just as they were in the medieval guilds - and as they are today in massively multi-player online gaming guilds. Where visionaries have built these hubs, and people have come in search of productivity, fellowship and mentorship, we are beginning to see talent clusters emerge.

Companies whose remote workers find one another in urban hubs aren't threatened by the connections their workers make with people from other companies. Instead, the sparks created by fellowship and discovery fuel energy and initiatives.

Take out the HBR corporate language of productivity and what does this sound like? It is the ongoing conversation we're having in the Jewish community about how to re-imagine the use of our synagogue buildings.

We built physical spaces throughout the twentieth century with a "presenteeism" understanding of Jewish community. It went like this: If people just come into the building and are present for services, school and programs, something meaningful will emerge.

We have found that this logic has not held up. I hear it from synagogue leaders who ask, "What are the newest, most creative program ideas that get people in the door?" "What can we do to get young people to come to services?" "How do we make our services more interesting?"  They're watching the numbers in the sanctuary decrease and imagine that changes to what goes on in the sanctuary will bring those numbers back up.

The expectation of "presenteeism" misses the point. It is true that Judaism is best experienced and practiced in community, but defining our community and the quality of experience by how many people show up in the spaces we built is what we need to change.

This is more than merging two or three congregations into one building. We do need to accept the fact that more mergers are going to happen in the next ten years because of changing demographics. This also isn't about offering space in your current building to a chavurah or emerging kehilla.

This is about re-thinking hubs of activity and relationships. What are some examples in our kehillot?

• The leaders of three congregations in one community are exploring a vision of locating their joint religious school based on educational function, rather than choosing one synagogue location. This means looking at options that might place classes for the children in a site other than the synagogue buildings, and creating shared family experiences in all of the synagogues throughout the calendar year.
• The moving minyan: two or more kehillot collaborate and rotate minyan to various sites, rather than trying to get everyone to one synagogue building twice a day.
• Snowbird and Sunbird services: Rabbis and lay leaders travel in the winter to hold special Shabbat services for their members who spend the season in warmer cities. Or they co-sponsor summertime services in vacation areas with the synagogues in the resort areas. 
• Sharing the two-year communal adult education program, Context, sponsored by the Jewish Theological Seminary. Collaborative partners of Context become the hub for high level, intellectually rigorous study using local scholars and resources. The Conservative kehillot in Hartford, CT, Greater Washington, DC, Middlesex County, NJ, and many others in New York, Long Island, Brooklyn, and Queens are just the beginning.
• Congregational schools are beginning to use Shalom Learning, an online platform, for their learning curriculum and family engagement.
• The adult education program on Conservative Judaism at Beth Judah in Ventnor, NJ, connected speakers from the Conservative movement, including USCJ's CEO, Rabbi Steven Wernick, by webinar to their congregants who either watched at home or viewed the recording later.

The suggestions in the Harvard Business Review article about how companies can make changes also apply to our kehillot:

• Focus on collaboration. 
• Reconceive physical space.
• Tap remote talent.
• Invest in intuitive technology.
• Recognize idiosyncracy.

In a nutshell, where can we start? 

Move out of the mindset that only sees people in terms of membership and participation numbers. Both are tied to the bottom line of maintaining our buildings. Look, instead, at relationships and action. Is there a group you just wish would stop wanting their own services in their homes and come to Kabbalat Shabbat in your chapel? Is there a person who has all kinds of crazy ideas about adult education? Recognize their idiosyncracies and energy. Help them take one step towards their dreams. There might be others who want to join them. Don't get in the way.

Where can people collaborate? Where are points of energy in your community, regardless of location? What kinds of technology that people use at work (Webex, Go-to-Meeting) can bring resources to your community instead of trying to bring people or speakers to your building? 

No one expects anyone to sell off synagogue buildings in the next five years in favor of an online homeschooling chavurah-type Judaism. Let's recognize, though, that the presenteeism of the 20th Century doesn't work anymore, and the world is already giving us clues about where and how people want to naturally find each other in the future.

A Roomful of Conversation

If you were planning to host a party with the goal of having as many people as possible talk to each other about as many topics as possible, how would you design the seating? One long table or several small ones?

But think about it - why make them sit at all? What if there are no seats so people can mingle at will? Must it be inside, then? Whoa - stay with me - why can't you give them an outside trail to follow so they find each other on the path!

How would you plan the conversations? Let's go back to the idea of tables: Is there someone at the head of the table you'll assign to lead a discussion or will people naturally find the topics of mutual interest if you just give them the chance to sit near each other? If there will be leaders, how do you decide on the topics? Do you choose topics based on what the leaders would like to talk about? Or do you pick the broadest categories possible, have the leaders start the conversation, and trust that each person in the room will have some life experience to shape what follows?

How many conversations? How many choices? Won't it get overwhelming if there are too many? Will people not bother to come at all if there are too few?

These kinds of questions, and the exciting, (sometimes meandering), trails that creative thinking takes us on, have been the feverish focus behind the scenes at United Synagogue since late last summer as we embarked on planning our Centennial Celebration in October.

It's the Conversation of the Century. That's a whopper of a claim.

So how did we decide to approach this party with the goal of as many conversations as possible?

SEATING: We chose "All of the above." With an expectation of more than 1,000 people coming over a five day period that includes a Shabbaton, we're creating every possible combination of putting people together. There will be one "table," (ok, a huge auditorium), with one speaker to start the conversation, and choices to continue at other "tables," (aka conference rooms). We're setting aside spaces for reuniting with old friends, finding people who share your interest or your challenges, (Calling all synagogue presidents!). Want to walk around and mingle? A Centennial Square will help you find food, services, entertainment and your friends. There will be paths to follow through historic Jewish Baltimore, and service opportunities to leave behind something that will help others.

CONVERSATIONS: We chose eight big topics.

The Spiritual Conversation

The Global Conversation

The Personal Conversation

The Eternal Conversation

The Interfaith Conversation

The Israel Conversation

The Communal Conversation

The Future Conversation

Thought leaders, (some who will surprise you), will start the conversations.

Two examples: Clive Lawton, the founder of Limmud, will start the Global Conversation, based on his 20 years of experience spreading Jewish learning around the world. The Interfaith Conversation will get a start from Dr. Amy Jill Levine, Professor of New Testament and Jewish Studies at Vanderbilt University. Her insight into the similarities and differences between Christian and Jewish theology has drawn thousands to her speaking engagements.

A variety of other people will pick up the ball and continue the conversations in what we're calling "Follow the Conversation" workshops. You are invited to be one of those people. This is where we move from one table to many. But here is where we also want to diverge from just hosting a party with lots of conversations to convening a gathering where conversation leads to action.

Our Follow the Conversation workshops are expected to give people information, tools and resources where they can take next steps. Because what's the point of conversation if it doesn't help us to grow?

So come to the party. Stay for the conversation. Go home stronger than before.

See you there!

Life and Death

Did you know that there were no deaths of U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan last week?

I learned this on Friday night, before the recitation of the Mourners' Kaddish during Shabbat services at Beth El Temple in Harrisburg, PA. I didn't see it in newspapers, although this morning I found references from the Associated Press to January's casualties being the lowest monthly number since 2008, with an explanation that it is related to troop withdrawal. If PBS's News Hour reported it with their weekly list of the troops lost in the war, I missed it (because I was in shul).

I was powerfully struck by the announcement. Instantaneously, I had an image of how for one week, no parent of an American soldier got the dreaded knock on the door about their child losing his or her life. Regardless of the political or tactical reasons that would account for the number, at that moment when our prayer service instructs us to think of death, there was one place where I realized that death did not reach this week.

Our liturgy is filled with ways to not only help us pass through suffering, but also opportunities to regularly be thankful for peacefulness and wholeness. I view the morning prayer, Asher Yatzar, thanking God for the inner workings of our bodies, as well as prayers for healing and mourners kaddish, as brilliant reminders for us to notice the gift of each moment.

Rabbi Eric Cytryn has included the names of the soldiers who died that week during Beth El's Shabbat services since 2003, when he began his tenure. Rabbi Cytryn said that it's possible that some people thought that it was a political statement, but he always considered it the role of a religious community to create awareness of matters of life and death. That is the power that is possible in a religious community of practice. For me, it was a beautiful example of how our communal practice of prayer can help us connect with matters that transcend politics, and continually give us opportunities to reflect on the gift of life.

Living Room Learning as Relational Judaism

I spent the last six weeks deeply connecting and then retreating from community. First, I intensively trained several boards and leadership teams, then headed away for two weeks of relaxation.

I spent the final days of my vacation in northern Virginia, in a cable TV-free farmhouse overlooking the Shenandoah River and the majestic mountains blanketed in snow, with some of my family and a dog named Rufus.

It was in the mountains, separated from all community, that I thought about this well-known text from the Mishna quoting Hillel, (Avot 2:5):

הלל אומר אל תפרוש מן הצבור ואל תאמן בעצמך עד יום מותך ואל תדין את חברך עד שתגיע למקומו ואל תאמר דבר שאי אפשר לשמוע שסופו להשמע ואל תאמר לכשאפנה     אשנה שמא לא תפנה:

Hillel said: Do not withdraw from the community. And do not trust in yourself until the day of your death. And do not judge your fellow until you have put yourself in their place. Do not say something which cannot be heard (on the assumption) that eventually it will be heard. And do not say, 'When I have time I shall study,' perchance you will never have time.

[AJWS translation and Hebrew text from On1Foot]

I picture this as an illustration of the power of relationships to both empower us and challenge us.

For me, it is spatial. I envision concentric circles of communal involvement, with the most involved people at the center and least involved in the outside areas. The instruction from Hillel is this: Don't allow yourself to be drawn away from the gravitational pull of the community.

It's the quote that helps us argue in favor of synagogue affiliation, Jewish study, volunteering, and leadership.

But the reality is that affiliation and participation numbers among all religious groups in America are shrinking. One third of adults under age 30 identify themselves as having "no religion," and the number of unaffiliated adults rose from 15% to 20% in five years, according to a Pew Research Study released in October 2012. Leaders of our Conservative kehillot complain of decreasing participation in a myriad of programs, and are always on the lookout for new ideas that will bring people from the periphery into the synagogue buildings that are supposed to house the center of community. 

In a Synagogue 3000 report last year, Dr. Ron Wolfson gave this advice about how to approach decreasing engagement:

We have to move from a synagogue of programs targeting different populations to a deepening relationship between the synagogue and their members...The best way to root people in the life of the congregation is through relationships. If we don't people will drop their memberships, and that's a big problem.

What Wolfson and others have called, "relational Judaism," challenges leaders to stop imagining that the gravitational pull of programs will bring people towards the center, and, instead, cement bonds throughout the community based on sharing experiences and building relationships. Here are examples from some of our kehillot: 

• The vice president of a 300-member congregation in Pennsylvania began inviting two or three families per month to his home for Shabbat, with the goal of having Shabbat dinner, or at least making the invitation, to every person in his community by the time he finished his presidency.
• "Guess Who's Coming to Shabbas?" - the relationship-building initiative organized by Debbie Albert of Temple Sinai in Dresher, PA, with the goal of getting all 500 member families to host or be a guest at Shabbat dinner, has had almost half the congregation involved already. 
• The president of a 150-member congregation organized a "listening campaign," asking people to host "town halls" in homes so that she could hear what they cared about in their community. In six months, every member came to a town hall and met someone new in the process.
• "Living Room Learning," offered at Congregation Torat El in Oakhurst, NJ, where Rabbi Aaron Schonbrun creates a Jewish learning experience for any 10 people who organize a meeting in someone's home in the community.
• The Sulam for Emerging Leaders rabbis, trainers and participants in 30 kehillot - more than 250 people - are learning together right now, having Shabbat dinner and then opening up the circle of relationships to involve more people in the experience.

These examples put the possibility of engagement everywhere, not in the middle of concentric circles that increase towards the center. Relational Judaism reverses the imaginary spatial diagram of community.

Instead of warning people about moving away from the center, Hillel's injunction speaks directly to leaders who think they are at the center: Don't YOU separate yourself from the community. Remember that the community is not where you are, it is all around you. Your responsibility is to move throughout it. Create connections. Build relationships without an expectation of what will come next.

Through a series of conferences in the coming months, (March 11 and 17 in United Synagogue's Mid-Atlantic district and April 14 in our Northeast district),  we will be looking for examples of relational Judaism by highlighting visionary strategies of engagement and learning.

And it will be our Centennial Celebration, "The Conversation of the Century," in October 2013, that will be United Synagogue's movement-wide relationship building experience. Watch for online and in person conversations that are beginning now.

Finding kehilla in Las Vegas

The last month took me from hurricane-damaged New Jersey and New York to Las Vegas, where a first-ever gathering of United Synagogue's General Assembly of Kehillot was held. About 130 of United Synagogue's affiliated congregations were represented, serving as a shareholders' group. United Synagogue's board of directors met at the same time, privileged to be addressed by Michael Leven, President and COO of the Las Vegas Sands Corporation, who shared very touching stories about the formation of his Jewish identity and that of his children.

Next door, more than 400 members of the Women's League for Conservative Judaism held its 2012 convention, learning from Rabbi Elliot Dorff, Chancellor Arnold Eisen, and Dr. Ron Wolfson, who unveiled Women's League's new strategic plan.

Remarkable women were honored by Women's League, like Blanche Meisel, who began her life in New Jersey as a passionate worker in the movement for Soviet Jewry and, after retirement, continued to make an impact on the Las Vegas community and in Israel, helping to establish the TALI educational program at the HaDror School.

And, in the custom I have written about before, we all gathered for a Shabbaton prior to our meetings on Sunday, spending time in the two Conservative synagogues in the area.  Shabbat, Las Vegas-style, meant music-filled services at Temple Beth Sholom, and a welcoming motzei Shabbat dinner at Midbar Kodesh that featured one of their members, Dr. David Schwartz, speaking about gambling in the Jewish tradition - a perfect topic as we prepared to spin our dreidels later in the week.

Although we didn't stay on the Las Vegas strip, it is impossible to escape casinos - they're in the airport, for Pete's sake. Our hotel  had a casino area strategically placed in the center of the complex of buildings; you had to walk through it to get to the conference center and hotel rooms.

Besides conducting business in the meeting rooms, the Women's League volunteers, Conservative movement organizational representatives, Jewish communal professionals, vendors and visitors renewed friendships, held planning conversations and made introductions in the hallways, in the restaurants, between the rows of gamblers in the casino, and in the outdoor walkways.

Even with the background noise of slot machines, we found kehilla - community.

Hurricanes and Hunger

I have not written a post since Hurricane Sandy hit because I have been busy. I was one of the east coast residents who lost power and had a home damaged.

Don't feel sorry for me. I have two homes, and was able to live in one with only the discomfort of power out for four days while the vacation home was flooded. We're finding out now the extent of the structural damage to the foundation of our home in addition to the appliances we lost. But all will be repaired and replaced. We feel lucky.

I use the word, lucky, intentionally, because it's usually luck we think of first when we try to explain who and why disasters, accidents, or illnesses strike. The idea of luck is complicated, though:

• Hurricane Katrina didn't affect me. Was I lucky then and unlucky during Hurricane Sandy? 
• Was I luckier that my two bouts of breast cancer in my 40's were treatable, compared to my friend's terminal pancreatic cancer when he reached his late 60's?
• My parents raised me in a three-bedroom, one bath, house, feeding six people on a total of about $20 a week in the 1960's. Today, I have two houses and plenty of food. Am I luckier than my parents? 

Our rabbis and sages knew there is no way to measure or compare luck based on what happens to us.

From the Babylonian Talmud, Moed Katan, 28A:

תלמוד בבלי מסכת מועד קטן דף כח עמוד א

אמר רבא: חיי, בני ומזוני, לא בזכותא תליא מילתא, אלא במזלא תליא מילתא. דהא רבה ורב חסדא תרוייהו רבנן צדיקי הוו, מר מצלי ואתי מיטרא, ומר מצלי ואתי מיטרא. רב חסדא חיה תשעין ותרתין שנין - רבה חיה ארבעין, בי רב חסדא - שיתין הלולי, בי רבה - שיתין תיכלי. בי רב חסדא - סמידא לכלבי ולא מתבעי, בי רבה - נהמא דשערי לאינשי, ולא משתכח

Rava said: Life, children, and food do not depend on merit; rather, they depend on luck. For Rabbah and Rav Hisda were two righteous rabbis - one would pray and rain would come, and the other would pray and rain would come. [Yet] Rav Hisda lived 92 years and Rabbah lived [only] 40 years. In the house of Rav Hisda there were 60 marriages; in the house of Rabbah, 60 deaths. In the house of Rav Hisda, there was pure wheat bread for dogs, and they did not want. In the house of Rabbah, there was even a lack of [poor quality] barley bread for people. [Translation by Uri L’Tzedek]

(Thanks to On1Foot for the Hebrew and translation above.)

While we can't predict or control luck, we can control how we approach the suffering we see around us. Our communal response to the people affected by Hurricane Sandy has been inspiring, from New York's combined efforts to national support, and, also, United Synagogue's response in cooperation with the Rabbinical Assembly.

There is another initiative beginning today that is less in the headlines, but is equally intended to respond to suffering: the Jewish Community Food Stamp Challenge.

One in six households in America struggle with hunger issues. Hunger isn't like a hurricane; it doesn't have people shouting out warnings and predictions of it. It doesn't fill our news reports or even our Facebook pages. It is up to us to call on each other to be aware of it, and our clergy and Jewish organizations are doing that this month. 

The Food Stamp Challenge has support from across the Jewish communal spectrum, and is sponsored by the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, MAZON: A Jewish Response to Hunger, United Synagogue, the Rabbinical Assembly, Cantors Assembly, Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, and the American Conference of Cantors.  Read about the rabbis, cantors and other leaders who are taking the Food Stamp Challenge. And for an inspirational framing of the challenge, read the Kol Nidre sermon from Rabbi Robyn Fryer Bodzin, of Israel Center of Conservative Judaism in Flushing, NY.

The "challenge" is to live for a week on the food that can be purchased with the same amount of money as a person on food stamps: up to $31.50 per person, or about $1.50 per meal. You can participate in several ways by taking the Challenge yourself and setting up a donations page, or donating the amount of money that you would have spent on food for the week to an organization dealing with hunger issues, or donating to someone who is taking the Challenge. Go to the Conservative Movement's Food Stamp Challenge Facebook page to also find out about how synagogues are supporting these leaders.

Because of the interruption of many of our lives from Hurricane Sandy, the organizers of the Food Stamp Challenge are moving the window of time to take the Challenge by Thanksgiving. There is still time to do it. There is always time to donate.

A hurricane reminds us about luck. The rabbis reminded us that luck affects food as well. We can't stop a hurricane, but we can work together to diminish hunger.