HIGH HOLIDAY SERVICES FOR SINGLES Join us for a community-wide Rosh Hashana Service hosted by Temple Kol Ami Rabbi Norman T. Roman officiating Monday, September 25 8:00 p.m. 5085 Walnut Lake Road, West Bloomfield (1 1 4 miles west of Orchard Lake Road) 810-661-0040 Holiday oneg following services Gates of Repentance prayerbook will be available, or bring your own Participating Congregations REFORM Congregation Shir Tikvah Temple Beth El Temple Emanu-El Temple Israel Temple Kol Ami Temple Shir Shalom CONSERVATIVE Adat Shalom Synagogue Congregation Beth Abraham Hillel Moses Congregation Beth Achim Congregation Beth Shalom Congregation B'nai Moshe Congregation Shaarey Zedek Next Singles Shabbat Program: Friday, October 27, 8:30 p.m. at Adat Shalom Synagogue, featuring Rabbi Reuven Hammer The program is sponsored by the Michigan Board of Rabbis in cooperation with The Jewish News. These Rosh Hashana services are funded by the Max M. Fisher Jewish Community Foundation of the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit. NIBBLES & NUTS Next time you feed your face.. . Wish Someone You Love L'Shanah Tova Tikatevu A Beautiful Tray Tilled With Special Candy, Dried Fruits and Nuts. 737-8088 33020 NORTHWESTERN • W. BLOOMFIELD VISA MOM= Outside Of Michigan 1-800-752.2133 Master Card ORDER EARLY • HOLIDAYS BEGIN SEPTEMBER 24th think about your heart. 4 American Heart Association WERE FIGHTING FOR YOUR LIFE Christian Right Can Be Dismissed No Longer Road to Victory is perilous path for Jews. JAMES D. BESSER WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT L ast weekend's Road to Victo- ry conference of the Christ- ian Coalition was an effective, carefully orches- trated display of political power. The coalition has become a ma- jor force — possibly the dominant one — in Republican politics. Its 1.7 million members have demon- strated an ability to shape the na- tional agenda as few grass-roots organizations have before. But that message has not fully sunk in for the Democrats and the Jewish organizations that have led the fight against the coalition's legislative agenda. Both groups still tend to dismiss the Christian right as fringe play- ers whose religious radicalism eventually will puncture the bal- loon of their newfound political presence. And Jewish and Democratic leaders, while pointing to the very real danger of bigots and extrem- ists who are riding the Christian Coalition bandwagon, have failed to articulate an alternative vision for America that speaks to the anxieties and angers that are in- tensifying this political whirlwind. Against that backdrop, the Christian Coalition meetings in Washington were revealing. Among the 4,000-plus dele- gates, the mood was upbeat and confident. Most of the Republican congressional leadership showed up, hats in hands. And all of the GOP presidential contenders — with the well-publicized exclusion of Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., — were embarrassingly lavish in their praise of the group. House Speaker Newt Gingrich was greeted as a conquering hero; President Clinton's name was al- ways accompanied by a kind of verbal sneer. The clear emphasis was on practical politics — coalition build- ing, working with local officials, using the Internet, lobbying Con- gress and working the media. Gone were the exhibit hall ven- dors hawking radical causes that were so visible at previous con- ferences — there were no T-shirts with lurid accusations against President Clinton and his wife. The most radical organization in the hall was the National Rifle As- sociation. But the key dogmas of the far- right faith were not barred from the proceedings; this was an au- dience that still could get worked up about "socialized medicine" in the form of administration health care proposals, and speaker after speaker raged against a govern- ment they believe is corrupting America's moral core to enhance the power of bureaucrats and politicians. Political realism was the over- arching theme. This is a group that is beginning to understand its own power, and is eager for more. At past Christian right gather- ings, my badge identifying me as a member of the Jewish press sin- gled me out for a kind of fawning friendliness that always seemed to culminate in questions such as "but do you feel fulfilled as a Jew?" Not this time around. Members seem to have decided that they will win their battles through pol- ished political advocacy, not reli- gious proselytizing. And the group no longer seems to feel compelled to explain itself to a doubting Jew- ish community. The ordinariness of the dele- gates was surprising. These were not backwoods ignoramuses, as some stereotypes would have us believe, or AK-47 toting believers in "black helicopters." Mostly, they seemed like ordinary, well-mean- ing middle Americans who are ac- tively organizing around concerns shared by millions of others. The fact that the Christian Coalition's answers are offensive to most Jews does not alter the fact that the group has achieved a political maturity and a grow- ing mastery of the strategies of democratic activism, and that it is fully in sync with the fears and furies that keep Americans awake at night. Jewish leaders correctly point out that the Christian Coalition harbors dangerous conspiracy the- orists, bigots and crackpots. The Rev. Pat Robertson himself, the Christian Coalition founder and chairman, has promoted conspir- acy theories that are chilling in their semblance to the paranoid fantasies that in the past have proven deadly to Jews. That makes the recent suc- cesses of the group in main- streaming itself all the more disturbing, since the far-out con- spiracy mongers are able to hitch a ride with a group that is re- defining the American center. But the Jewish community's fo- cus on the Reverend Robertson and his far-out theories, and not on the political sophistication of Christian Coalition director Ralph Reed, adds to our tendency to dis- miss the group as an aberration; it makes it easier to underesti-