Celebrating 20 Years of Partnership in Building Sacred Community

Keeping Connected  June 2019

Dear Friends,

It is with a great sense of humility and gratitude that I write to thank the entire Congregation Shalom community for the wonderful celebration of my 20-year tenure with the congregation. I am still feeling the glow and WOW of the evening! It was a beautiful event for everyone: wonderful music, story-telling, friendship, pictures, food, drink and more. The sanctuary and social hall were filled with flowers and smiling faces. The energy in the room was high and people loved being together. I hope that we will find more opportunities for all of us to gather like this each and every year.

THANK YOU to everyone who participated in making the evening happen. I LOVE the book that the students in the school made. For the adults who did not see it, each child was given two prompts, one of which was “If you could give the Rabbi 20 of anything, what would you give her and why?”. The children wrote wonderful messages and I will keep the book in my office if anyone would like to see it. The tallis clip that Phyllis Howard made (which is in the shape of a Hamsa with an Eilat stone) and leaf on the Tree of Life are both very, very meaningful to me. I will cherish them both. Thanks to all those who came out to celebrate. I know there were many, many people there and I am sad that I was not able to greet and visit with each of you. I was, however, able to read the messages in the guest book and I am so grateful to each of you for being there with our community.

When I first came to Congregation Shalom in 1998, things were very different.  I was not yet a mother and the Congregation had about 100 families. Much has changed since those early days. Our school has flourished and our community has expanded with an energy and a vibrancy that we can all be proud of. We have an expansive program of adult education and our commitment to Tikkun Olam remains an abiding foundation of our community. All that we have done has been predicated on a partnership between lay people and professionals that puts Jewish values at the center of all our work together. I look forward to future years when we can learn from our past experiences and build upon our strengths. Most of all I hope that we can continue to work collaboratively and envision together how our community can thrive in the years ahead.

Warm regards,

Rabbi Shoshana Perry