As the synagogue programming calendar winds down for the summer, the synagogue recruitment calendar gears up for the new membership year. Every year, in the paper, throughout the summer, advertisements ring out. Every synagogue in the area will be searching for new members. Unfortunately, our community is very transient. Members come and members go.
Families break up.
Bar Mitzvahs happen and families leave. In order for a congregation to remain stable, it needs to replace all those who are departing. Temple Beth Am has never had a year in my tenure in which less than a hundred people left. Fortunately, we have been able to replace them every year, and in some years, significantly decreased the departures so that we have a net growth. For the last four or five years we have remained fairly constant at about a thousand families, though our families become younger every year.