So Much to Choose From! So Little Time!: United Synagogue’s International Biennial Convention Comes to Boston
By Joanne Palmer
(Reprinted from the United Synagogue Review, Fall 2005)
Say that you’re interested in, oh, spirituality, and a friend you often run into at United Synagogue’s biennial convention simply is not. Not at all.
But that friend, who loves to sing, wants to learn about nusach, the traditional melodies that make up different parts of the liturgy.
And a third friend, who is tone-deaf and deeply involved in social action, wants to talk public policy.
At this year’s biennial convention, set for Boston from Sunday, December 4, to Thursday, December 8, the three of you – and your spouses -- can choose talks and workshops based on your interests, listen to such big-name speakers as Rabbi Harold Kushner; debate hot topics including outreach and intermarriage, gender and the rabbinate, and the state of the Conservative movement; learn Jewish texts; learn theory and then get in some practice in synagogue music; consider fund-raising strategies; and talk, talk, talk. (And eat, of course.)
This year, convention organizers are reaching beyond its traditional base, synagogue leaders, with “a whole series of programming options for people who are interested in synagogue issues but might not be synagogue leadership,” says Rabbi Paul Drazen, United Synagogue’s head of congregational services, who is in charge of the convention’s programming.
The range of offerings go from the deeply practical – Dr. David Mersky of Mersky Jaffe and Associates will head a two-day fundraising institute, where he will examine such questions as the difference between development and fundraising and provide information on how a synagogue can establish firm financial footing for itself – to the more individual and internal.
Rabbi Hayim Herring and Robin Neidorf of STAR -- Synagogue Renewal and Transformation – are planning to lead workshops on marketing and communications, teaching “stakeholders” – anyone, professional or lay, involved in helping a synagogue flourish – how to present their communities as clearly and effectively as possible. “Some of our discussion is theoretical, about strategy and approach, but we also get into the nitty-gritty of hands-on work,” Ms. Neidorf said. “We talk about things like synagogue newsletters. How do you make a newsletter an effective marketing tool, so it’s not only about the synagogue but addresses the audience?
“How do you get people in the synagogue door? I’ve yet to hear about a synagogue that doesn’t say it offers a warm, welcoming environment, so how to you differentiate between its warm, welcoming environment and the warm, welcoming environment down the street? Each synagogue has to learn what they do uniquely well, instead of trying to be all things to all people. That just doesn’t work.”
Rabbi Jerome Epstein, United Synagogue’s executive vice president, and Rabbi Moshe Edelman, head of its leadership development and congregational programming department, will oversee a multipart program on keruv, or outreach, particularly to intermarried families. The Conservative movement as a whole has been revisiting that extremely controversial topic, hoping to change the perception of the Conservative world as cold and unwelcoming to intermarried families.
“Although we cannot welcome intermarriage, we must welcome the intermarried,” Rabbi Epstein says. “We are committed to helping congregations develop constructive language that will enable them to inspire intermarried families to live Jewish lives.”
“If we want Jewish families to be Jewish in the next generation, we have to do something,” Rabbi Edelman adds. “We have to change the perception among people who are nonaffiliated, or intermarried, or even those who are affiliated but think the opportunities are limited in Conservative synagogues. We’re not changing our standards, though. We will maintain the halacha but change the attitude.”
Twenty years ago, Rabbi Amy Eilberg became the first woman to be ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary. Today, she heads the Yedidya Center for Jewish Spiritual Direction in California.
“I am involved in introducing a practice called spiritual direction to the Jewish community,” she says. “It a practice by which a person meets with a spiritual guide or companion – a spiritual director – or with a group of people to receive support in exploring how the Divine is present uniquely in his or her life.” That practice began outside the Jewish world, Rabbi Eilberg says, but many Jews have begun to embrace it as well. “As Conservative Jews, we’re profoundly practiced in studying how the Divine is present for our people collectively, but we haven’t always given quite as much attention to individual spiritual dynamics, to how the holy shows up in a person’s life. In recent years, there’s been a revival of interest in the individual’s relationship with God.
“That’s not a new thing,” Rabbi Eilberg continues. “It’s as ancient as the Psalms, as old as the rabbis’ own prayers that are scattered through the Talmud. It’s as old as the Chassidic masters.” And, she adds, she’s glad to have a chance to talk about spiritual direction with the Conservative movement because “I’m a Conservative rabbi. I very much want to share the transformative spiritual work I’m doing with my own community.”
Rabbi Neil Gillman, who has been at the Jewish Theological Seminary for 50 years, first as a student, then as an increasingly visible and eventually venerated teacher, will give the main talk on Monday night. He plans to talk about the Conservative movement. Rabbi Gillman, a philosopher, is passionate about the movement; both his love for it and his unease as he sees it seem to flounder are likely to make themselves felt.
“I plan to challenge the movement on its ideological and theological lack of focus, and on its failure to create a committed, observant laity,” Rabbi Gillman says. “I don’t think the lay community gets our message. There is a chasm between the vision of the Conservative movement at the seminary, among its rabbinate, and among the laity. The disparities in the understanding of where the movement is among these three constituent bodies are cosmic.”
And that’s trouble, he feels. “The movement’s losing people. The best of our people are drifting off in both directions, toward the modern Orthodox and the Reform. The center is not holding.”
But Rabbi Gillman thinks there’s a great deal of hope. “We have the most intellectually sophisticated laity in centuries,” he says. “Our population knows how to think, and thinks about a whole bunch of other issues. All we have to do is challenge them to think seriously about their Jewish commitments.”
Rabbis Elliot Schoenberg and Julie Schonfeld will talk about the survey of women in the rabbinate that was released to mark the 20th anniversary of the ordination of women. (That was Rabbi Eilberg.) The survey “acknowledges that the advancement of our women colleagues has lagged beyond that of their male counterparts,” Rabbi Schonfeld said. “We will help congregations identify the root causes of this discrepancy and address it productively. We believe that it is in the best interests of the entire movement if all our congregations and institutions are able to make use of the skills and talents of all our rabbis, regardless of gender.”
Other options include workshops for congregations with fewer than 200 or more than 750 member units, an ulpan Hebrew-reading course, an open meeting of the Committee of Jewish Law and Standards, and the Public Policy Institute. Because the convention is the meeting of a large but close community, it will also include the presentation of the Solomon Schechter Awards for Excellence and also the Framework for Excellent Schools award, and United Synagogue’s new international officers will be installed on Wednesday.
The range of offerings reflects the range of approaches available in the Conservative movement in general, and in United Synagogue as its congregational division, says Rabbi Drazen. “United Synagogue is made up of a lot of pieces. Let’s see if we can renew and rebuild it together, and make it work.”
For more information or reservations, go to our website, www.uscj.org, or email convention@uscj.org.
