Welcome!

West End Synagogue is a hybrid community with services available both in person at our synagogue and on Zoom. We welcome you to join us! Please click here  for Shabbat services information, and check our calendar for the latest on which services of our services are hybrid and which are zoom only.

At West End, we are Jews and loved ones of Jews and non-Jewish seekers, young and old and in between, highly educated and just beginning to learn, happy to pray in a traditional matter and constantly seeking innovation, theists and atheists and agnostics, seekers of spiritual centeredness and of community, lifelong New Yorkers and immigrants international and domestic. Among our congregants are singles, couples, two-parent families, single parents, LGBTQ+ people, interfaith families, Jews of Color, Jews by Choice, children, Millennials, Gen X-ers, Boomers, and elders. We do not agree on everything, and we find ourselves at West End for a range of reasons, but we are all committed to helping our community thrive and to welcoming those who step in our doors.

West End’s heartbeat is its commitment to community. People at WES, whether attending their first Shabbat services or entering their 30th year of membership, tell stories of others at our synagogue wanting to meet them, know them, and support them. Membership is more than a financial contribution; it is an ongoing invitation to build a spiritual home serving all who reside within. We are also committed to working to better the world outside our doors through our social action initiatives.

As a Reconstructionist Synagogue, West End operates with deep respect for tradition and a willingness to lovingly question halakha (Jewish law) when it conflicts with modern moral living. Our liturgy eschews the concept of Jews as a chosen people, opting to focus upon our own choice to continually engage in Jewish life. Shabbat Services at West End are grounded in music, guided by clergy, and celebratory of lay leadership—reflecting our belief in Judaism as an evolving religious civilization intended to serve each generation differently from the last. We know it to be our task to hold our two worlds, religious and secular, side by side.

We are eager to begin a conversation with you. Please don’t hesitate to reach out with questions, visit us for services or adult education programming, or rabbiemily [at] westendsynagogue.org (send me an email) just to say hello.

Blessings,

Rabbi Emily