One recurring aspect of the summer months in observant Jewish communities is how the parshiot frequently highlight the challenges of Jewish leadership. From the spies’ sedition against Hashem’s plans for the conquest of Canaan, to Korach’s open rebellion, to numerous instances of public grumbling against Hashem by the people, as well as the personal trials Moshe Rabbeinu faced with Aharon and Miriam’s private criticism of him, and later their deaths, Sefer Bamidbar is replete with examples of the trials and tribulations that a communal leader faces.
In our modern day, the Jewish communal leaders we often have the most contact with are our shul presidents. While the tasks they handle do not equal those of Moshe Rabbeinu, they too may experience intense opposition, unexpected obstacles and exasperating circumstances.
In the interest of understanding the tests of Jewish leadership, as experienced by our shul presidents, The Jewish Link asked three recent Central New Jersey shul presidents what has been the most difficult challenge they have faced, in their terms as presidents, and how did they handle it?
Here are the answers the previous shul presidents provided:
“The most challenging part of being a shul president was managing the different personalities of all the members and volunteers,” said Avi Berger, the owner of Legendary Realty in East Brunswick and the past president of Congregation Ahavas Yisrael in Edison.
Berger continued, “One of the more difficult situations I had was dealing with a volunteer who held an important role in the shul. He put his heart and soul into everything he did, but, as with any organization, there were times when his plans and ideas were not accepted or were not feasible to implement. His response when he was told ‘no’was to threaten to quit. After this happened several times, I explained to him that his service and ideas are indeed very valuable to shul and I wanted him to continue in his role. However, threatening to quit every time his ideas would not get implemented was not acceptable. There are times when things either won’t work, or not everyone thinks it is a great idea. But, if he threatened to quit again, I would accept that as his resignation. This worked out very well. He stayed on for many years, volunteering much time and energy, with no more threats. Sometimes, there was much healthy discussion about ideas, but without the tension that the threats had brought in the past. I believe he meant no harm at any time and just didn’t realize the level of angst created by his choice of words.”
“I think that one of the most difficult decisions that I had to deal with had to do with a congregational meeting, in which the congregation was to hear about the shul’s renovation plans,” said Steve Deutsch, a speech/language therapist and immediate past president of Congregation Ohav Emeth in Highland Park. “Some parts of that meeting didn’t go well. Then we had to have a second meeting so the congregation could vote on whether to approve the plans. A group of us met to plan out a strategy of how to deal with any challenges that arose during the meeting and I had to pick one member of the renovation committee to deal with those difficult situations. I was told that in the past, one influential congregant had derailed previous renovation plans. I selected one of the members of the renovation committee to deal with these sharp questions and asked him to please not get emotional. Baruch Hashem, he rose to the challenge admirably and the renovation plans were approved. And now we have a very, very beautiful renovated shul building.”
“The hardest challenge I had, by far, as shul president was announcing the passing of a child from the bima,” said Jeremy Renna, vice president of partnerships at LIDS Sports Group and immediate past president of Congregation Ahavas Achim in Highland Park. “I had to do that twice. Sharing such devastating news, you have to understand the emotional tenor of the shul and recognize your own strong personal feelings. I still get emotional when I think about it. One of the situations was expected, as a baby was born with a serious health issue. The other was unexpected. In both cases, I had to be discrete when I heard the news and wait until the proper moment to share the information with the congregation. These were the only times when I purposely left out my standard ‘Good Shabbos!’ greeting, at the start of my announcements, because the situation was just too sad.”
By Harry Glazer
