Erev Rosh Hashanah 5785
What is your Beth Emeth story?
Tonight, we begin the new year, and we have come to this place. I suppose we could be someplace else, at a different congregation, Reform, Conservative, Orthodox, Reconstructionist, Renewal, unaffiliated, or something else. We could, in this day and age of the livestreamed experience, be on our couch or at our dining room table, the laptop or iPad or smart tv tuned to the congregation of our choice—or no congregation at all. We could be out to dinner, or reading a book, or sitting in the woods somewhere. We could, in our world of choices beyond imagination, be anywhere. But we are here, either in-person or virtually, sitting with people we have known, or perhaps with strangers we are only just getting to know.
Why are we here? And not just because it’s Rosh Hashanah. Why are we here? What brought us to this congregation, this space? The music? Friends or family? A connection to its history, or to our own personal history? Is it about the values of this place, expressed in the poster of communal ethics mounted on the wall or by our food pantry just next to it, or the rainbow flag just a few feet away, all expressions of how we live our congregational ideals. Why are we here?
We are here, on some level, because the story of this congregation is our story; because we have decided, each of us for different reasons, to help write that congregational story together. That’s as true for the person who comes here once a year as the Friday night regular, the child who comes on Sunday morning as the adult who comes to Torah Study, and on and on. We are here because we understand that the congregation’s story is a shared story.
This is true, as it must be for our Temple of Truth, from the very beginning. The Beth Emeth story begins in May of 1905, when an ad went out to the greater Jewish community inviting them to “a meeting of those who are desirous of organizing a modern Jewish congregation in this city.” 33 individuals showed up, and so began a nearly 120-year journey to this moment. Along the way, this congregation has advocated for social justice in our community, supported Israel, and innovated endlessly on worship, music, and engagement of those who might be turned away from elsewhere, including the intermarried, LGBTQ+ individuals, and more. We have counted amongst ourselves notables like Estella Frankel, who wrote some of the music we use in our holiday celebrations, Henry Schenker, who worked tirelessly for interfaith dialogue, and his beloved Verna, whose voice is, for generations, the voice of Isaiah. Politicians like our Deb Heffernan and Jack Markell, and activists like Sonny and Gil Sloan, Communal builders like Milton and Hattie Kutz, national leaders like Connie Kreshtool, and rabbis and cantors who have gone on to make an impact in our community. But also b’nai mitzvah students who have lobbied in DC with the Religious Action Center, religious school kids who have sung at Lodge Lane and the Kutz home, myriads of people from all walks of life who have studied and taught Torah to all ages, people who have worked quietly in the background to welcome new people, set up chairs at a shiva, hold someone’s hand in the hospital, or dance at a wedding.
So, what is your Beth Emeth story?
Each of us has a story that connects us to this place, our spiritual home. Mine began fifteen years ago, in June of 2009, when my then-young family and I came to Wilmington for me to serve this “Temple of Truth”. We have watched our son grow from attending the JCC preschool to preparing to graduate high school this year, celebrated consecration, bar mitzvah and confirmation, and have done our best to be a part of this amazing community and city. I have seen staff and board changes, and together we have prayed, celebrated, sung, grieved, advocated, learned, comforted, and supported one another, and b’ezrat Hashem, God willing, we will continue to do so together.
But I ask again, what is your Beth Emeth Story?
What drew you here? What connects you to this place? Was it a family connection, or the hope of belonging to a Reform congregation? Have you been here since you were born, or did you come recently? Was it for your own learning or your children’s? Was it a connection with a family or an individual that brought you in, or the hope to join the Jewish people but find your own path? Or was it something else?
Back in June I invited everyone to share their stories, and I’ve asked several people by invitation to share their Beth Emeth story. It’s important for us to hear one another’s stories, because that’s what makes us a community, and not just consumers. We didn’t just ‘buy’ a life cycle event, or education for our kids—we decided that, based on our experience, that this was our place. Here are some of those stories.
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Phil Weinberg: Although my wife, Sheila, and I had been living in the Wilmington area of Delaware for several years we had not joined a synagogue. In 1978 when our oldest child, Carrie, was approaching 8 yrs old we decided to do a search for a synagogue and enroll her and our younger daughter, Alyssa, in religious school. Sheila was very intent on doing this. Sheila and I had already visited two other synagogues but found that neither met our needs. One Friday evening Sheila attended Beth Emeth and upon returning home informed me that she had found THE congregation that met our requirements. We attended the next service and discovered, to our delight, the members read in unison and many of the prayers were in English. During the Oneg, we found the members very warm and friendly. We also enjoyed the music of the organ and choir. In addition, I liked that I did not have to wear a yarmulka or tallit.
Upon joining Beth Emeth, we enrolled both our daughters in religious school. We, as well as most of the congregants, loved Rabbi Grumbacher, who at that time, was director of the school as well as assistant Rabbi. We immediately got involved with several committees which helped us get to know many of the members. Eventually I began attending Sunday morning Brotherhood meetings which met every day when Sunday school was in session, eventually becoming Brotherhood membership chair, treasurer and then, president. As Brotherhood president, I attended Board meetings and got to learn how the synagogue operated. Sheila joined the board, too, being responsible for organizing the Chavurot. She had also been on the adult ed. and religious ed. committees, and both of us had been on the membership committee. After several years I was elected Treasurer of Beth Emeth, followed by Finance Chair and vice-president, and then followed by House and Grounds chair. During that time, we attended Friday services almost every week as well as many Saturday morning services. We ushered for confirmation services for many years, and I represented the board many times for Bar and Bat Mitzvahs.
Our children were consecrated, had Bat Mitzvah, and were confirmed at Beth Emeth.
Although I am still on the Finance and Endowment committees, 45 years have passed by since we joined, and age has caught up with us. We are no longer very active in congregational activities. But we are glad that Beth Emeth continues to be a warm and welcoming congregation. We hope our new and future members continue to enrich Beth Emeth as Beth Emeth enriches their lives, just as it has ours.
Laurene and Deb: My name is Deb Hedrick and my wife of 31 years, Laurene Eheman, first came to Beth Emeth shortly before Pesach in 2005 to explore becoming Jews by Choice. The spiritual journey to Judaism for Laurene was a long one and its tenant of tikkun olam is what I was looking for. As members of the LGBTQ community, we knew a reform congregation would welcome us. At that service, Rabbi Sarah spoke on “Dayenu” – if God had only done (blank) for us, it would have been enough. It resonated with us such that we knew we found a home in Judaism and also at Beth Emeth.
We participate in as many programs as we can despite the drive from where we live in Dover. Laurene especially loves the adult ed programs. We have been members all these years because we found a home as Jews by Choice and also as members of a community. We felt welcome, even if we sat in the back and didn’t introduce ourselves. Many of the people we have known at Beth Emeth since 2005 are no longer physically with us, but they are still in our hearts, especially Verna Schenker.
We plan on moving to the Wilmington area in the next few years so we can fully participate in the congregation. We don’t have children nor family nearby and know that the Beth Emeth community will help us if needed as we age. (pause) Thank you. Thank you for welcoming us, praying with us, supporting us as a LGBTQ couple, and being the type of people who would lend a hand to a congregant you might not know. We couldn’t be prouder to have embraced – and be embraced by – the Jewish people and be a member of Beth Emeth.
Rob Goodman: My name is Rob Goodman and Jan and I have been members of Beth Emeth since 1996. This is when we relocated from Northern Virginia to Wilmington. We moved to Wilmington to be closer to our families at the time in Allentown, PA and Merrick, NY. Jan and I had been raised in reform homes, so joining Beth Emeth when we came to Wilmington was a no brainer. I should say, that for families that have been at Beth Emeth for a long time that my grandmother was Rabbi Grumbacher’s assistant when we joined the congregation, so Beth Emeth was not an unknown for me. Our involvement has varied over the years as I was a board member, was a member of search committees, and Jan is a past President of WRJ and of the Congregation. Through the years Beth Emeth has been important to significant lifecycle events including my parents funerals as well as our kids B’nai Mitvot. As we look forward, I’m sure there will be more opportunities to celebrate and observe with Beth Emeth in the future. Beth Emeth is important to the Wilmington Jewish community by providing a welcoming and accepting congregation for all Jews regardless of your interpretation of customs that sees each of us as equals.
Todd Flubacher: My name is Todd Flubacher. My family’s been members of the synagogue since 2011. In 2010, I took the Jewish conversion course and shortly thereafter, we joined Congregation Beth Emeth, still as an interfaith family, and my son began Sunday religious school. We participated in a few social groups and my son deepened his Jewish identity. But somewhere along the way, for some reason, we stopped being members. Then almost exactly 7 years ago, my wife Aimee had heart failure and a heart attack and was in the cardiac ICU at Christiana Hospital. It was a very difficult time for our family. Our children were just 14 and 7. Cantor Stanton and Rabbi Robinson visited Aimee at the hospital. And Rabbi Robinson called me and called our son, Avery, on the phone to provide emotional and spiritual support. It was so comforting, and was something that we really needed and couldn’t have gotten from anyone else. And it was totally unexpected. We later learned that at some point, we must have identified our prior membership at Congregation Beth Emeth in the hospital records and didn’t even remember doing it. And somehow, just like that, the synagogue was there to support us. We had a profound realization of how important it is to belong to this community. We re-joined the synagogue and since then, we’ve experienced life events like death in the family and our daughter’s Bat Mitzvah this past Spring, which was one of the most beautiful experiences of our lives. Belonging to the Congregation has actualized the place Judaism has in our family’s life.
Jan and Deb: I came fully out as a lesbian when I turned 40. A couple of years later, I met Debra Johnson, who is now my wife. She’s Jewish, I was not. But from early on in our relationship, we sometimes prayed together. We both had a need to connect with God without a strong concept of what exactly that was. We visited a few different spiritual communities – but they didn’t really give us everything we were looking for.
One day Debra brought up something that had been weighing on her mind: when she died, where would she be buried? Where would she, a biracial daughter from an Orthodox Jewish family, and I, raised in liberal but very unstructured Unitarian-Universalism – where exactly would we find a community where we belonged?
Because Debra decided that she wanted to be buried in a Jewish cemetery, we started visiting local synagogues. The second one was Beth Emeth. After our first service, we turned to each other and said, “We really like this one!” We both were teachers, and the number of happy, confident children we saw here, along with people of all ages, spoke well for the health of this community. We enjoyed the ritual and the singing; and the words of Torah spoke to us.
I started out by saying I’d commit to coming once a month, and with no intention of converting. But once we started, we both wanted to keep coming. It was the perfect combination of communal ritual, a warm and welcoming community, a strong commitment to social justice, and full acceptance of us as a lesbian couple. We kept coming back.
By the following spring, when I heard that year’s confirmation class talking about living a Jewish life, I was ready to say, “That’s what I want, too.” I started taking conversion classes, and by early next summer I had my Beit Din, immersed in the mikvah, and was welcomed into the tribe. I became a part of encouraging other LGBTQ+ people to feel welcomed and involved here. I always feel the support of this congregation, and I’m grateful.
Andrew and Tali Zeltner: We are Andrew and Tali Zeltner. We decided to join Beth Emeth almost a year ago, after the events of October 7. Until that time (for various reasons), we were not active in synagogue life but have always felt a strong connection to Judaism and the state of Israel. The months following the tragedy of October 7 have been particularly challenging, especially with helping our oldest son navigate his early college years at a time when students who offer any positive views regarding a vibrant Jewish state are sometimes met with scorn and even violence on campus.
For us, Beth Emeth is a place where we can not just feel safe, but also be able to participate in a Jewish community at a critical time in Jewish history. We are happy to be members and would be even happier to meet more of the Congregation.
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New stories are being written all the time: stories about values, community, love. Stories about safety, belonging and dignity. As we look ahead to our 120th anniversary, we need to continue to tell our stories—not just our historical stories about the past of this place, but the stories that we are telling now and that that are being written even as we speak. Because it’s not enough to just tell stories that have happened—we need to share what is happening in this moment, to recount all the ways this place has made a difference in our lives, and how we feel we are able to make a difference for others through this place.
In our tradition, on birthdays, we say ad me’ah v’esrim, may you live to be One Hundred and Twenty. As we approach 120 (and beyond), may we share each other’s stories with one another, strengthening each other and this place, helping to continue that story that began at the Northeast corner of Fourth and Shipley streets at the turn of the last century.