They cannot determine what the future will be but give us a snapshot of where we are. And they allow us to be strategic and smart about how we steer Jewish life.

Through my varied professional responsibilities - overseeing synagogue membership, outreach, programming, and eventually philanthropy - I increasingly focused on ensuring that all our lay and professional efforts were in alignment with our vision so that the sacred could be experienced regardless of the portal through which one entered.  

Leaders of our congregations had to pivot in March of 2020 to new methods of engagement and connection as the “flow” of our work and community interactions radically changed.

This month we celebrate the graduations and ordinations of a new class of our Jewish future: rabbis, cantors, educators, and non-profit leaders, newly ready to take on the challenges of the 21st century and foster our communities to be vital centers of learning, engagement, and identity building.

In Reform congregations across North American, teams of clergy, staff, educators, and lay people have worked together to develop innovative ways to re-open, re-enter, and reimagine our Jewish community life. But the challenges that congregations face in strategically thinking through reopening are more than any one community should have to take on alone. The Reform Movement as a whole will continue to work to help congregational communities envision and plan for the future.

Dear Synagogue Leaders,

We keepers of the flame
Of Jewish communal living

Know --
If we haven’t already done so
That the time to go back
Is arriving soon.

We want to go back to in-person worship
We want to go back to in-person meetings
We want to go back to

Not surprisingly over the past number of months, the word “hybrid” has become popularized to refer to this new world we have entered. We want to make an argument for a new, and more precise term that some congregations have started to use: multi-access.

The first wedding at which I officiated as a newly ordained rabbi was on the island of Maui. The couple planned their ceremony in a location that rarely received significant rainfall.

As the STEM educator and director of education, respectively, at Temple Shir Tikva in Wayland, MA, we’re sharing reflections on introducing STEM to Jewish learners in our building pre-COVID and in our online learning community.