““I argue that synagogue leaders have it backwards. Engaging individuals is what will lead them to affiliate with a synagogue as the institution that serves them, that meets their needs and those of their family. If synagogues continue to focus on the needs of the institution rather than on the needs of the individual, they will lose their dues-paying members and eventually become financially unviable. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel suggested to folks in the 1960s that they pray with their feet—and those prayers took them to places like the civil rights marches in Selma, Alabama. As a result of the actions of Rabbi Heschel and the influence of American political culture, American Jews—like most Americans—have been taught to vote with””
