Synagogue Security

nThe first time I visited a synagogue was during my freshman year of high school in 1981. My father, at my request, took me to Beth Sholom Congregation, an Orthodox synagogue in Chattanooga, TN, the next county over from where we lived. We did not know about Jewish time, but when we arrived, we were greeted with a rather guarded welcome – first, the parking lot was blocked off for Shabbos, so we parked on the street. I had the letter from the rabbi, whom I had written about visiting, but people seemed wary. We met briefly with the rabbi before the service. There was one visitor from Connecticut who had grown up in the congregation who was friendly. I was enchanted by the service, and by the end, everyone was very welcoming and friendly and seemed more interested in feeding us than in eating themselves at kiddush. I was amused when someone offered my father, a devout Southern Baptist minister, a shot of whiskey, which he politely declined, and the man smiled and said, “Never touch the stuff, right?”

Toward the end of high school, I began attending our own town’s Episcopal church, St. Luke’s, Cleveland, TN. One of the interesting things about it was that the church building had never been locked. Now, the church office with the offering prior to deposit was in the parish hall building next door, which WAS always locked. The sacristy of the church with the silver was locked. There was even a velvet rope so that people remained in the last several pews. But it was open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

I only learned about the reason for the contrast between the wariness of the Orthodox synagogue members and the unlocked door of the Episcopal church two or three years ago when I was reading information about Beth Sholom on the internet. Their previous building was bombed in 1977 and they had to build a new building. Fortunately, it was on a weekday and no one was injured – but this is still a horrifying blot on our nation’s history. This was fairly common in the South in the 50s, 60s, and 70s – quite a number of synagogues were bombed. Perhaps the most famous was the Temple on Peachtree (which I attended occasionally several years later when I lived in Atlanta).

There is an alarming rise in antisemitism in this country and around the world – more synagogues have been attacked in the several years – the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018, a synagogue in Melbourne, Australia last year, a synagogue in Manchester, England this Yom Kippur – and many others. Most churches don’t have armed security at the door on Sundays – many synagogues do – and the ones that don’t have unarmed security to a degree not found in most churches.

It’s time to say no to attacks on synagogues and other houses of worship.