From the Presidents Desk
Dear Congregation, it seems that last months article created a lot of talk amongst you. This is good, it means you read what I have to say & think about what is written.
I have been told by some of my friends within the congregation that some of you think I have a secret agenda. This is NOT true. What is true is that a lot of TBH volunteers are the non-Jewish spouse of an inter-faith marriage. A lot of the parents bringing & picking up their children for mid-week Hebrew & Sunday school are not Jewish. A number of the volunteers who help keep the Temple running are not Jewish. We don’t tell them they can’t help out in the Temple because they are not Jewish.
If you have not heard it is very difficult to get congregants to run for the board. Just look we could not get anyone to run for the Executive Vice-President position. I know a lot of well qualified congregants who are not Jewish who would love to do more for the Temple but are precluded by our present by-laws. I have heard that they should convert to Judaism & then they will be accepted on the board. Granted this would be the ideal solution, but this is not the case for everyone. These non-Jews are dues paying members who are raising Jewish children. These non-Jews are living in a Jewish household. These non-Jews for all intensive purposes are living Jewish lives.
Did you know that the Founding Fathers of the US wrote that the US Constitution should be reviewed for changes every twenty years? How often do we do that? Look what it takes to get one amendment passed.
My point is, change is important in our Temple because people change. We are different from our parents and grandparents and we want different things now from our religious experiences. Let us not forget that the traditional
siddur was the result of many centuries of work and different ideas. And even today there are differences in Ashkenazi and Sephardic experiences.
Let us embrace change. We may not always like it, but we can always change it again!
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