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A new rabbi has joined

the new cantor as

Congregation Beth Ahm

begins next chapter.

SHELLI LIEBMAN DORFMAN
Staff Writer

R

abbi Charles Popky had a feeling
months ago that Congregation Beth
Ahm members were serious about
making him their new rabbi.
"When they sent a delegation to my home to
convince me to move there, I was very
touched," he said.

the rabbi at Temple Emanuel in Newton Centre,
Mass. He is a 1988 graduate of the Jewish
Theological Seminary in New York City, with
an undergraduate degree in Near Eastern and
Judaic Studies from Brandeis University in
Waltham, Mass. He also spent his college, rab-
binical school and early rabbinic years in a vari-
ety of staff positions at Camp Ramah in the
Pocono Mountains.

Deciding On Detroit

Rabbi Charles Popky
takes his position as
spiritual leader
of west Bloomfield
congregation.

Rabbi Popky, who began Aug. 1 at the West
Bloomfield synagogue, was selected after a six-
month search process that included having syna-
gogue President Ronn Nadis and someone on
the search committee spent a weekend in the
rabbi's former neighborhood in Lowell, Mass.
They attended Shabbat services there at Beth El
Congregation, where Rabbi Popky had served
since 1997.
- "We were very impressed with Rabbi Pop ky's
background and credentials," Nadis said. "But
we knew that other candidate-shuts would be
similarly impressed: So we wanted to make a
statement that we were serious about pursuing
him. We decided that coming to him would
make that statement."
The feeling apparently was mutual when the
rabbi and his wife, Alison, spent Shabbat with
Beth Ahm Executive Director Dr. Elliot H.
Burns and his wife, Sharon, after the rabbi con-
ducted services at the synagogue, affiliated with
the Conservative movement.
Prior to his time in Lowell, Rabbi Popky was

Rabbi Popky's decision was swayed by meeting
the Beth Ahm congregation, he said.
"Obviously, the externals impressed us —
being in a wonderful thriving congregation in a
wonderful, thriving community. But we were
also impressed with the warmth of the people
and their desire not just to hire a rabbi for cer-
tain functions, but to create a relationship and
build a vision with," Rabbi Popky said.
He is familiar to some in our community,
including many rabbinic colleagues, among
them Rabbi Aaron Bergman, who left Beth Ahm
June 30 to become director of Jewish studies at
the Jewish Academy of Metropolitan Detroit in
West Bloomfield.
Looking forward to helping the synagogue
continue to grow into a house of study and a
house of prayer," Rabbi Popky said his goals
include continuing adult-education program-
ming and a meaningful prayer experience for the
congregation.
As a pulpit rabbi, he expects to be busy with
pastoral work for the more than 600 Beth Ahm
families. "But beyond the life cycles, the main
focus will be knowing the community and the
congregation and to build relationships," Rabbi
Popky said. "A successful match requires more
than rabbinical skills."
The weekend of Sept. 8-10 will mark the
official installation of both Rabbi Popky and
Cantor David Montefiore, who began at the
synagogue on July 1.
With a new rabbinic position, a new West
Bloomfield home and his•and his wife's first
child due in November, the rabbi said, "We're
just looking forward to a lot of wonderful things
happening all at once. We see the general and
Beth Ahm community as a wonderful, nourish-
ing place to raise a family." ❑

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