The 3rd Friday Night Family Service - Chanukah Special!
SDRS is proud to announce our new family service. The third of which was held on Friday, 30th December 2005.
In Rabbi Elf’s own words, “the service was held on a cold, wet and windy evening, quite miserable, after a very cold week of snow and ice”. Inevitably, this and the holiday period meant that the service was held with only three families (five children) and eleven adults.
Rabbi Elf ensured that ‘the show went on’. Three Chanukiyot were lit, several Chanukah songs sung (including Maoz Tzur, Ner li, Herman the Chanukah Candle and Judah the Macabee). The service ended with a special Chanukah kiddush, including doughnuts, latkes and Chanukah gelt.
Many thanks to Rabbi Elf for conducting a very informative family orientated service despite the lack of children.
Wednesday,
23 November 2005 saw a ‘Celebration of Cultural Diversity Event’ (for HMRC*
staff) held in Portcullis House Southend. Around seven to eight hundred people
attended the occasion, including the Deputy Mayor. Mike Royston and Lewis Miller, HMRC staff and members of our synagogue helped to run a
stall.
Displayed were a range of foods and religious garments, showing their link with the Jewish festivals. Mike and Lewis were able to explain about the Jewish faith and displayed posters advertising our synagogue’s website, so hopefully we’ll get some extra hits.
There was a lot of interest, and many visitors to the event stopped to have a free taste of Jewish food, including cholla and Mike’s mum's home made lockshen pudding! Many people were keen to find out more about the food and the part it plays in the Jewish way of life.
The Jewish stall was just one of many that featured a range of faiths and ethnic origins, reflecting the wide cultural diversity of those who work in HMRC and in the local community.
The event also raised over £2,000 for local charities; Fair Havens, HARP and John Grooms. It’s nice to know that our synagogue helped to achieve this.
Many thanks to Mike for providing the information used on this page and for the photographs.
* Formerly Inland Revenue and Customs and Excise.
Nosh Corner and Nigella Lawson!
Nigella
Lawson has given permission for two of her recipes to be reproduced on our
website. This is somewhat of coup
for SDRS, as similar requests from other organisations have been turned down. Many
thanks must go to Nigella Lawson, her online forum and Julia Levy for acting as
a go between.
To view the two recipes, ‘(Special) Chicken Soup With Meatballs' (Chicken ones of course) from ‘Feast’ (Passover Section) and ‘Bagels’ from ‘How to Be A Domestic Goddess’, please click here.
Do you have a personal kosher recipe you’d like to see on Nosh Corner? Providing it’s own work or you have permission from the author (in writing) we’ll be happy to give it a home on Nosh Corner for the world to see. E-mail your recipe to the Webmaster.
Kita Ketanim gets new furniture
With
many thanks to Brenda Lee (our PR council member) and her recent appeal on local
radio, SDRS has “new” tables and chairs in our Kita Ketanim classroom. Which
came from a primary school in Chelmsford that was raising money for a local
charity.
SDRS was happy to donate to a worthy cause and are delighted to have received much needed furniture in return. The child friendly tables and chairs have made a great impact on our ever growing and increasingly more popular Cheder class for the younger children.
For more details about our three Cheder classes and teachers click here.
Saturday,
12th November 2005 saw the first SDRS Bingo Quiz, a departure from
our usual and more traditional quiz night.
The game involved answering a general knowledge question, selected by the draw of a ball. The game was a bit convoluted, but basically to win you had to answer six questions correctly and the answers needed to be six consecutive on the individual’s quiz sheet.
Although the questions appeared quite difficult we had several winners in each game. The over-all winner was decided by a tiebreak question.
The final winners of each game were, in round one: Mary Elmer, Malcolm Rueben, Carol Burns and Dennis Bauman. And in round two: Alan Goldstein, Ian Miller, Barbara Goldstein and Tony Harman. Each won £10. Well done to all!
Thanks must go to: Diane Miller, Lewis Miller and Sue Levitas for organising a fantastic event, our quiz master for the evening, Philip Freeman and his two assistants Devorah and Richard Levy. Many thanks also to all those to stayed after the event to help clean up the synagogue hall.
We had mixed reactions on the new style quiz, some thought it was brilliant whilst others said they prefered the more traditional. It is likely that next time we will return to our old quiz format. Diane Miller would appreciate feedback about the evening and the new caterers.
The Friday Night Family Service
SDRS is proud to announce our new
family service. The first of which was held on Friday, 28th October
2005.
The service was well attended despite being held on the week of half term. There were about twenty three people, although only a couple of Cheder families.
Many thanks to Rabbi Elf for conducting a very informative family orientated service despite the lack of children. A warm up for next month, we hope!
Interfaith - SDRS Takes The Lead
Southend
and District Reform Synagogue has been awarded a grant of £24,110 from the 'Faith
Communities Capacity Building Fund' for its leading initiative: SEE (South East
Essex) Interfaith in Action. Competing with over 2100 applications from across
the UK, Home Office Minister, the Rt. Hon. Paul Goggins (pictured) has announced grants to
enable local organisations to contribute towards community cohesion via a range
of interfaith activities.
The synagogue will use the funds to create a dedicated Interfaith Community Centre which will welcome groups from schools, churches, mosques and interfaith groups as well as local interest groups. The Community Centre will house a range of resources and equipment for use by the public. The whole project will be led by an Interfaith Community Worker who will liase with faith groups across Southeast Essex and initiate a range of projects in consultation with faith leaders, teachers, the local authority and other community groups.
Since the horrific events of September 11th 2001, Southend and District Reform Synagogue’s Rabbi Rabbi Warren Elf has been actively working to bring faith-based groups together in a greater dialogue as a way of easing tensions.
“We believe that interfaith dialogue is vital in today’s society to overcome misunderstandings and to develop trust between members of different groups and religions.”, says Rabbi Elf…”We are delighted that this award will enable us to develop the interfaith work we are doing, to engage with more individuals and groups and to develop the resources that create the opportunities for more interfaith activities.”
For further information, please contact Fern Potter (synagogue Council Member) via e-mail or at the synagogue address.
The
council and cheder worked hard on Sunday, 16th October 2005 to put up our
Sukkah. The SDRS Sukkah is quite
unusual in the fact that it’s indoors!
Unfortunately SDRS doesn’t have any outdoor space so we’re left with no option but to have it in the synagogue hall. On the plus side the rain will never ruin it and thanks to a Star-of-David suspended under a skylight, not only can we see the sky but we can see a star 24-7. At least ours will be the most unique Sukkah you’re ever likely to see!
The council assembled the frame in the synagogue hall early in the morning, added the greenery and prepared bags of fruit. The cheder helped to decorate the Sukkah with paper chains and pictures prepared in the morning classes. Thanks to the cheder teachers, the cheder and the council SDRS once again has it’s very own one-of-a-kind indoor Sukkah.
A Havdala and Selichot Service
The first SDRS Havdala and Selichot Service was held on Saturday, 24th September 2005. The event was attended by fifteen people, which wasn't bad considering it was a bit last minute! No excuses next year to the rest of you!
The evening started by lighting the Havdala candle which was held (in keeping with tradition) by youngest girl at the service. The evening continued with tea, coffee and cake. After the break Rabbi Elf held a forty-five minute Selichot service.
Many thanks to Rabbi Elf for conducting an excellent service (especially since he was fighting off the effects of a bad cold), to Sue Levitas and Diane Miller for preparing the 'feast' and to everyone else for attending!
As the adage goes regarding buses, you wait forever for one and then three turn up at once! That’s certainly true of bar mitzvahs as well at SDRS.
Recently we have celebrated the bar mitzvot of James Fairman (shown left) on Saturday, 20th August 2005 followed by Sam Neagus (shown centre) on 17th September 2005 and David Droppa (shown right) on 24th September 2005.
To James, Sam, David and all their family, many congratulation and mazeltov!
Interfaith Service with Southend Mosque
In
keeping with our Rabbi's ethos of establishing interfaith dialogues it was our
great pleasure to welcome to our
Synagogue on Saturday, 3rd September 2005 the Imam and members of the congregation
from Southend Mosque.
This most recent event follows a visit by members of our congregation to their Mosque earlier this year.
Rabbi Elf led an explanatory service for their benefit. Following the service he brought out a Sefer Torah for our visitors to view explaining the significance of the scroll and its garments. SDRS hope that this tradition of sharing our faiths continues.
Stuart Lee, the Synagogue's Honorary Treasurer, celebrated his 65th birthday on Saturday, 3rd September 2005 with a lovely kiddush in his honour. Stuart and his wife Brenda, Development Committee and Public Relations, also recently celebrated their 43rd wedding anniversary. Mazel Tov! We wish you many more.
