Synagogues Across U.S. Extend Open Invitation

Jews across the United States and Canada, including many who have turned away from some of the key tenets of their faith, are invited to a homecoming of sorts Friday.

On that day, an estimated 650 synagogues and Jewish organizations will open their doors to participate in a major cross-denominational show of unity.

With the aim of reaching Jews who are not affiliated with any particular synagogue or who have a marginal affiliation, “Shabbat Across America” is an open invitation to all Jews to attend Shabbat services and observe the weekly day of “rest, spirituality and communal worship” that many see as central to the Jewish experience.

Rabbi Ed Feinstein of Valley Beth Shalom in Encino, one of the largest Conservative congregations in the area, said he signed on because “it looked like a wonderful way to bring people home . . . and bringing people home is what we’re about.”

The event, conceived and coordinated by the National Jewish Outreach Program in New York, will include synagogues in the four major Jewish denominations--Conservative, Orthodox, Reconstructionist and Reform.

It is designed to “teach a generation of Jews about the beauty and significance of the Jewish Sabbath,” according to officials with the outreach program, who hope that the event will attract 65,000 Jews and that many will follow up with more regular temple participation.

Nearly 60 synagogues and Jewish organizations in the Los Angeles area are expected to participate. That’s up from 20 last year, the first year for the program.

The need to reclaim members who have strayed is especially acute in the Los Angeles area, where there are an estimated 519,000 Jews--only a third of whom say they are members of a synagogue, according to Marsha Rothpan, assistant director for the Jewish Federation’s Council on Jewish Life, citing the federation’s 1997 Jewish population survey.

By comparison, a 1990 study of the national Jewish population, shows that almost half, or 47%, have synagogue membership, according to Rothpan, who is coordinating L.A.’s involvement in the event.

“We have lots and lots of Jews who are simply not part of organized Jewish life,” said Rabbi Yosef Kanefsky of B’nai David-Judea Congregation, an Orthodox synagogue on West Pico Boulevard. “They are not meaningfully attached to any Jewish institution.”

The level of nonaffiliation here is “so much higher than say, New York, it’s shocking,” said Kanefsky, a former resident of Riverdale, N.Y., who heads the local effort. “There’s no question it’s higher here than other major cities.”

One factor that can lead Jews away from synagogue affiliation, Kanefsky and other observers said, is interfaith marriage, or unions between a Jew and a non-Jew.

Even though the 1997 Jewish population survey put the interfaith marriage rate locally slightly lower than the national average, several rabbis said they still view it as a significant issue.

Kanefsky cited the results of a study several years ago that said the chances are only about one in four that a child of an interfaith marriage will ultimately affiliate as a Jew. Under Orthodox Jewish law, a child is considered Jewish only if the mother is Jewish.

“So it’s had a devastating impact,” Kanefsky said.

Feinstein said he sees intermarriage not as a cause of estrangement but as “a symptom of a Jewish community that has not offered people a compelling reason to come [or stay] in.”

“They choose out; the question is how to bring them home,” Feinstein said, adding that he sees the national effort, coupled with “aggressive outreach” after the event, as one approach.

Kanefsky noted that Shabbat Across America “is not aimed at interfaith couples per se,” but he assumes that many will attend the service and preceding dinner.

“If they come, it might indicate a willingness to raise their children as Jews,” he said.

Kanefsky also suggested that some Jews who came to Los Angeles from other communities may have in fact been “running away from a more tightly knit Jewish community.”

“They’re not looking to be affiliated. They’re looking to be less affiliated, and these children are going to be even less affiliated.”

Yitzchok Summers, the second-generation rabbi at Anshe Emes Synagogue, an orthodox congregation in the Pico-Robertson area, also cited the lack of Jewish education as a factor in the level of nonaffiliation locally.

The previous generation focused on community outreach more than Jewish education, said Summers, a native of Los Angeles who 10 years ago took over the synagogue his father founded in 1948.

“If kids don’t get a Jewish education, it’ll be very difficult for them to grow up Jewish,” Summers said.

The good news is that in recent years there’s been “an explosion” of interest in Jewish education, said Summers, who teaches at Bais Yaakov, an Orthodox Jewish high school on the Westside.

One thing Summers does not see as a factor in the level of nonaffiliation here is the fractious debate over “who is a Jew.”

“I feel this whole debate is mostly organizations or policy statements fighting,” said Summers of the rancorous dispute that has pitted Orthodox Jewry against the more liberal Reform and Conservative streams that are so prominent in the United States. “One on one, I don’t see any problems. There is no gulf or gap between us.”

To focus on the theme of unity, national project organizers sent out a news release heralding a seven-point resolution on the importance of Shabbat for all Jews. It was signed by prominent leaders in the four major denominations.

The resolution was said to be a “rare interdenominational agreement,” marking the “first time that leaders of the major Jewish denominations have officially agreed to, and endorsed, a common understanding of Shabbat and its tenets.”

The resolution was endorsed by officials with three of the major congregational groups in the Conservative, Reconstructionist and Reform movements.

For the Orthodox branch, the signatory was a senior rabbi at a prominent Orthodox synagogue in Manhattan, not the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations.

Rabbi Ephraim Z. Buchwald, director of the national outreach program, said his organization had tried to enlist the support of the union last year, but the Orthodox body felt uncomfortable about any official participation with non-Orthodox groups.

“They didn’t want to get involved in the controversy of an interdenominational effort,” said Buchwald, who noted that the union did help suggest Orthodox congregations that might want to participate.

Even without official sanction, 137 Orthodox congregations are participating in this year’s event, Buchwald said.

“We have the support at the grass-roots level, which is crucial to us,” Buchwald said.

At least nine Orthodox synagogues in Los Angeles are participating, Rothpan said. “We’ve got a healthy mix,” he added.

Kanefsky said so many synagogues--Orthodox or not--signed on this year because “it really is a great opportunity to come together and to build on our common ground, rather than spending time pointing fingers at each other.

“There is an unquestionable Jewish unity undertone here.”