EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK
LETTERS
Letters are posted
and archived on JN Online:
www.detroitjewishnews.com
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The Little Shul That Could
ounded during a parking-lot conversation 18 years ago, the Troy Jew-
ish Congregation seemed destined to fail.
It had no rabbi and no sanctuary. And few Jews lived east of
Woodward Avenue.
Then came Rabbi Arnie, and its destiny changed.
Every once in awhile, someone comes along who moves spiritual mountains
and helps you touch the hand of God.
Rabbi Arnie Sleutelberg is such a person.
He's beloved by family, friends and colleagues, but says
humbly: "I have so much more to learn."
Rabbi Arnie was showered with plaudits on Shabbat last
week as the congregation, now Shir Tivkah, marked his "bar
mitzvah" year there and its chai, or 18th, anniversary.
Some 450 people came to honor him on his return from a
three-month sabbatical, where he probed the rhythms of his
soul through a visit to Israel and, later, the study of Buddhism
ROBERT A. in Nepal and Thailand. He asked worshippers to "soak one
another up" and we did; everyone clapped and sang and many
SKLAR
danced. In the spirit of Synagogue 2000, the national push to
Editor
invigorate our synagogues, we built upon each other's energy
and inspired each other.
We were inside, but the sun seemed to be shining on us as Simon Sleutelberg
performed the bar mitzvah ritual of placing a tallit on his son, Rabbi Arnie. The
prayer shawl has been in the Sleutelberg family for 100 years. Simon got it
about a month ago, especially for the celebration, from a cousin whose wife's
grandfather had it until he was sent to a Shoah deportation camp near Amster-
dam, where he died.
It was hard for congregants to stay focused on prayer as the rabbi, draped in
the tallit and bursting with pride, wiped away the tears while singing Shalom
Aleichem.
Rabbi Arnie has come a long way since growing up in the 1960s in the hard-
ly Jewish enclave of Hudson, near Jackson, where his family ran Meyers Depart-
ment Store. Under his spiritual leadership, Shir Tivkah has grown to 300 fami-
lies, built a Reform house of worship on a tree-lined corner of Troy, advocated
social causes and created new ways to learn for Jews of all ages.
Shir Tikvah openly appeals to traditional Jews, unaffiliated Jews, interfaith
families raising their children as Jews, gay and lesbian Jews, really anyone
searching for the nutrients of Torah. And it's thriving.
Shir Tivkah, Hebrew for "Song of Hope," has proven that religious unity is
possible in the midst of diversity. It welcomes and warmly accepts you for who
you are, period.
God's Way
What is Congregation Shir Tivkah?
Rabbi Arnie looked to last week's Torah portion,
Terumah, for the answer: "And build for me a sanc-
tuary, God says, that I might dwell among you."
"God can only be found where we let God in,"
said Rabbi Arnie. "We need to provide an opening
for God. It can happen anywhere — in the woods,
at home — but we may need help in finding a
place to become inspired and to have an opening
to let in God.
"That's what this plate is all about."
Rabbi Arnie
"No one hugs like Rabbi Arnie, no one smiles
like Rabbi Arnie," said Rabbi Paul Yedwab of Temple Israel in West Bloomfield
— a friend since rabbinical school. "He's just intensely loving and positive and
good."
Approaching Judaism much as Shir Tikvah does, with a similar dedication to
a vibrant, flexible congregation, "we at Temple Israel call ourselves Shir Tikvah
West," Rabbi Yedwab added.
Amid his second "bar mitzvah" year, it's not a stretch to say that Rabbi Arnie
gives of himself freely to help Detroit Jewry embrace Judaism's vigor — lifting
worship to something more than a spectator sport. .0
One Size
Does Not
Fit All
Archival Claims
Weren't Purchases
The Rabbi Leo M. Franklin Archives
Committee of Temple Beth El very
much appreciated your splendid arti-
cle on the 1867 cornerstone's home-
coming ("Cornerstone Comes
Home," March 2, page 7).
In the interest of complete accura-
cy, the unexpected discovery and the
Burton Historical Collection's return
of the cornerstone, and its return two
years earlier of the Beth El Collection,
did not involve purchases. Revival and
interest in the Franklin Archives made
the temple collection's return possible.
What was worked out to the mutu-
al satisfaction of the temple and the
Detroit Public Library was the return
of the original documents to the
Franklin Archives, coupled with reim-
bursement to "the Burton" for the cost
of having the collection copied on
microfilm for both archives.
This important community history
is now available to researchers at two
great institutions. The cornerstone is a
bonus: a visible reminder and evi-
dence of Beth El's history.
Mary Shapero
co-chair, Franklin Archives Committee
Temple Beth El
Bloomfield Township
Jewish Education
Foils Missionaries
The account regarding the danger
from missionary activities to our
youth ("Shock Treatment," Feb. 9,
page 11) reminded me of an occur-
rence in our family years ago.
It was in the late 1970s when we
lived in New York City. One Sunday,
our doorbell rang and, being busy in
the kitchen, my eldest son, Gilead,
then a student at RAMAZ, a
renowned Jewish high school on the
upper east side, answered the door.
There stood two clean-cut, white-
shirted, black-tied young men who
told him that they would like to
teach him about the Mormon reli-
gion. Eclectic and intellectually curi-
ous, he invited them in and took
them to the basement to what was
the beginning of a series of weekly
sessions, which, frankly, made me
increasingly uneasy. But I trusted my
son and decided to let nature take its
course.
LETTERS
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