Tell September 2018 Tishrei 5779

{A MOMENTOUS YEAR HAS PASSED, AND A NEW ONE AWAITS}
Rabbi Jeffrey Kamins
As we welcome our New Year,
we understand we have created
a moment in time to reflect –
individually, relationally and
communally – on the year
that has passed, and also to
envision the year we wish to
create. I will first recount some
of the milestones at Emanuel
Synagogue over this last year.
I gratefully acknowledge that
this year Rabbi Jacqueline Ninio
celebrated her 20th year as rabbi
at Emanuel Synagogue. She is an
incredible colleague and leader. Her
care for individuals, her passion for
social justice, her creative energy
in so many aspects of synagogue
programming, and her ethical
standards - alongside her sense of
humour - inspire me in my rabbinate
every day. Together we have gone
through so many changes at Emanuel
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Synagogue, yet as her project of
writing the history of Emanuel
Synagogue demonstrates, these
changes have been organic since
our founding in 1938 as Temple
Emanuel. Those founders envisioned
creating a communal centre beyond
a place of prayer, and finally, we are
on the verge of making that happen.
We now have the team and the space
to deliver a breadth and depth of
programming and engagement.
Rabbi Ninio and I have the support
of Rabbis Kaiserblueth and Triguboff
(on a part time and voluntary basis),
and also Reverend Zwarenstein. This
last year has also seen a dream come
true for me as well, with the return
of Cantor George Mordecai for these
Yamim Noraim and the months,
and hopefully, years to come. Those
who belonged to the synagogue in
the early 1990s will remember that
Cantor Mordecai and I, along with a
bare minyan, started the first Masorti
services in Australia – leading to
Emanuel becoming Australia’s only
pluralist religious community in the
21st century. Since George departed
for cantorial studies in 1995, he and
I have hoped to work together again,
and now he will work closely with
the rest of the clergy team to create
different and dynamic services and
opportunities for engagement.
Our embrace of diversity and
inclusion has contributed to
momentous events in this last year.
Federal legislation passed at the
end of 2017 enabled us to officiate
at Australia’s first (and to this day
only) same sex religious marriages
(Rabbi Ninio, Rabbi Kaiserblueth
and I have now conducted one
each). Furthermore, unique among
religious institutions, we have
changed our constitution this last
year to allow those who are not
Jews to become members in all
aspects of engagement, other than
having voting rights at the AGM.
We celebrate that our campus
reflects this inclusion and diversity.
We dreamed of creating a sacred,
harmonious space, and we have,
for the most part done so - our
beautiful entry and garden courtyard
nearly completed, the Neuweg
transforming into a lounge for
members where we can gather in
conversation and culture, the heritage
and new sanctuaries providing
different spaces for prayer, lectures,
musical performances, film nights
and so much more, and our stateof-the-art
preschool integrating the
generations to come. All that is left
to do is to rejuvenate our learning
centre (to the north of our original
heritage sanctuary) to include a