18 | SEPTEMBER 8 • 2022 

OUR COMMUNITY

C

ongregation Shaarey 
Zedek will be bringing 
back High Holiday 
Prayground for a second year.
Taking place during the 
High Holidays of Rosh 
Hashanah and Yom Kippur, 
this festival-style alternative 
program aims to provide a fun 
and unique twist on traditional 
services.
“We’re trying to find a way 
for us to have our [typical] 
High Holiday experience and 
to have religious and mean-
ingful services, but for people 
to also be able to experience 
the High Holidays and pray in 
their own way,” says Shaarey 
Zedek’s Rabbi Yoni Dahlen.
With music, yoga, a drum 
circle and more, High Holiday 
Prayground will offer some-
thing for congregants of all 
ages, including the synagogue’s 
youngest generations.

“The whole campus opens 
up,” Dahlen explains. “People 
are free to wander as they see 
fit and to find different ways 
of connecting to the holidays 
through a lot of different medi-
ums.”

STATION TO STATION
On both days of Rosh 
Hashanah and Yom Kippur, 
synagogue services take place 
from 10:30 a.m. to noon. 
Starting at 10:30 a.m., High 
Holiday Prayground also kicks 
off its festivities.
The main stage is the first 
area to open and caters to fam-
ilies and young kids. Starting 
at 11 a.m., other stations 
throughout the synagogue 
campus open.
High Holiday Prayground 
will include a yoga station put 
on in partnership with Citizen 
Yoga; a drum circle station that 

teaches rhythm and spiritual 
practice; and a Bubble Club 
with Lindsay Mall that includes 
learning Hebrew songs, music 
and dancing.
“Kids and families can go 
from station to station at their 
own pace,” Dahlen says.
The main stage, or home 
base, will feature an alternative 
service for all ages that includes 
a more musical and celebratory 
version of traditional High 
Holiday services.
It was an idea that was born 
in 2021, when the ongoing 
COVID-19 pandemic encour-
aged many synagogues such 
as Shaarey Zedek to reimagine 
their services in a way that met 
health recommendations and 
kept social distancing in mind.
“
A lot of young families 
came to us last year saying that 
they didn’t feel comfortable 
being inside [during the High 

Holidays],” Dahlen says. With 
many children still unvacci-
nated, the synagogue needed 
to develop an alternative to 
indoor services.
Luckily, 2021’s High Holiday 
season brought on beautiful 
weather that made an out-
door event like High Holiday 
Prayground possible. Last 
year, Dahlen says some 200 
members attended and that 

Congregation Shaarey Zedek’s family event returns for second year.
High Holiday Prayground

ASHLEY ZLATOPOLSKY CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Scenes from CSZ’s recent Young Families Musical Shabbat. “This event is very similar to what families with young kids might experience at 
High Holiday Prayground,” Rabbi Yoni Dahlen says.

Rabbi Yoni Dahlen

