If someone comes to us on Rosh Hashanah for their first encounter with Judaism, the last thing we want to do is ask them to pull out their checkbook. In an unusual move, a small Conservative congregation in Gardena that's planning a move to Torrance, Southwest Temple Beth Torah, is opening all its services to the public without tickets. And we'd like to have as many unaffiliated Jews as possible join us for holiday services, because we want them to see what we're all about and if they'd like to join us once we relocate. Goldman pointed out that her temple never turns away anyone who truly can't pay for holiday tickets, a policy of many area synagogues. And while horror stories abound of temples that have given financially strapped would-be congregants a hard time, and while it isn't a lot of fun to approach a synagogue kippah in hand, so to speak, it is often possible to arrange for tickets at a congenial shul at little or no cost.
Some synagogues make the tickets so expensive that it's cheaper to become members.
But we realize that people are at different levels of Jewish growth, and we don't want to shut people out of the experience because they can't afford it. So we're not going to price them out. But Aish does charge a nominal fee these days for its beginner's High Holy Days services, which used to be free. Keep in mind that some synagogues, for reasons of space or for philosophical reasons, don't make tickets available at all to nonmembers. When Rabbi Elazar Muskin arrived at Young Israel of Century City 15 years ago, he was informed that the Orthodox shul does not distribute High Holy Days tickets.