For part-time and stay-at-home moms, synagogue leadership offers a new way to keep our professional skills fresh and our brains alive and reminded me that the freedom to express ourselves must override the fear of rejection.

by Meredith Jacobs

When I was growing up in the ’70s and ’80s, the cantor of my Conservative shul in suburban Philadelphia, would leave the bimah when a woman read Torah. Now, a woman sits on that bimah every week as president of the synagogue. It used to be that the machars were all men—old men.  In fact, my mother and her friend Harriet left the Board of Directors because they found that meeting after meeting, their ideas were shot down-only to be brought up at a subsequent meeting by one of the men proposing the idea anew as his own.

The face of the shul machar has certainly changed. No longer are the women of the congregation relegated solely to Sisterhood to prepare Kiddush, spearhead fundraising for the religious school and organize meals for the sick or for families sitting shiva. They are setting up endowment funds, arguing with the Rabbi over changes in the services, and planning and executing major building expansions.

Ladies, this is not our mothers’ synagogue.

From the office to the synagogue board

To truly understand the climate change in synagogue lay leadership, we need simply to recall what has been happening in the larger business world. As we all know, women are educated members of the business elite. They are CEOs and entrepreneurs. Men have become more familiar with the idea of working along side—and even reporting to—women, and many understand the value women bring to the table as co-workers and as leaders. Gone are the days when the women on the synagogue Board were viewed by the men as merely “friends of their wives” who stayed home and cared for the house and children.

After all, the women who are filling the roles of leadership in synagogues are typically business women who chose to reduce to part-time hours or quit altogether after having babies. It makes sense: These women have the time to commit, leadership experience, and they are often seeking more stimulating activities than “Sing-a-long with Karen.” (Sorry, Karen, we do love you!)

Women are taking our professional backgrounds in fundraising, public relations, finance, education, and legal (to name just a few) and channeling that knowledge as we become synagogue Presidents, Vice-presidents and board members. In addition to this opportunity to stretch our professional muscles, we can make changes in our synagogues and religious schools that will directly benefit our children.  Moreover, these volunteer positions give us the flexibility to be home for our children.

Teachers of creative writing love to say that every new story is an echo of an old story retold with a twist. The writers past don’t just inspire but also provide raw material for new narratives. Therefore, it is essential for contemporary writers to read great literature.  Inspired by great Jewish authors, Dara Horn’s The World to Come in turn can energize contemporary writers.

Horn’s novel, full of twists and turns throughout places and time, is (at least in part) about Ben, a child prodigy, who steals a Chagall painting from a local museum, believing it belongs to his family. Horn then takes the reader through a wild journey that follows the fascinating life of this painting.

Being a Yiddish scholar, Horn conjures classical writers of Jewish literature such as Nachum of Bratslav, Sholom Aleichem and I.L. Peretz to shape her novel. One of her characters, Rosalie (Ben’s mother), plagiarizes these authors’ stories, presenting them as children’s books after publishers refuse to accept them with the “dead authors’ names.”  Ben defends his mother against accusations of literary fraudulence. “My mother,” he retorts, “rescued all these stories that were buried in library vaults and that no one would ever read again.” Horn’s infectious enthusiasm inspired me to steep myself in Yiddish literature. Her knowledge of Yiddish stories and their writers is a catalyst in creating her books, and her method becomes a lesson for any writer, including myself.

Women roll up our sleeves

It’s important to note too that women lay leaders are extremely desirable in the eyes of the synagogue’s professional staff because we don’t hesitate to roll up our sleeves.  We set the agenda and then come in to help stick labels on the envelopes.  The men I’ve worked with lead by delegating. They will create the rules of the shul and then expect the office staff to follow through. The response to reports of overworked staff is “hire more staff.”  Women, on the other hand, are more likely to create new initiatives and then recognize that we have to help do the work and not further burden an overwhelmed staff.

That is why to the extent that they can, the professional staff at the synagogue encourages and fosters the women leaders.  I have had many meetings with members of the staff at my synagogue.  As in any work environment, good relationships among co-workers foster a healthy and happy business.  As much as we don’t like to think of it as such, a synagogue is a business—and this business functions more smoothly when lay leaders and professional staff work well together.

Professional staff have their ways of helping a leader along her track—little things like being more likely to take her phone calls, make the effort of putting her projects at the top of their “to do” list.  A cooperative staff helps ensure your initiatives will be successful.  If a staff member sees you are willing to roll-up your sleeves and help—that you are aware of and respectful of their schedule and time—then they will be more likely to come to your aid.  I believe many women manage differently than men and that our style of management may be more conducive to a synagogue business environment.

There is no doubt that I am involved in my synagogue because my mother was.  Just as we find time to make Shabbat dinner, we make certain that our children view the synagogue as a place of importance.  Our involvement and leadership in the synagogue and in helping to sustain it, ensures that it will remain a priority in our children’s lives when they are grown. The icing on the cake for me is that I get the chance to put my brain, energy and creative resources to a use that I so strongly care about.

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