The $20 Million Question
Will Conservative movement’s new campus help the Israel-based Masorti movement?
By Michele Chabin
October 29, 2004

Jerusalem — It has taken six years and $20 million, but the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism finally has a campus in the heart of Jerusalem.

What remains is the question of exactly who should utilize it, and whether — as some in Israel maintain — the money would have been better spent assisting the movement’s financially strapped Israeli-based “Masorti” congregations and institutions. While the new campus will surely strengthen the Conservative movement’s physical presence in Jerusalem, it is too early to tell whether it will bolster the movement’s religious and political standing in Israel.

Non-Orthodox rabbis have no standing in Israel, meaning that the marriages, conversions and other services they perform are not recognized by the state. Although the government provides a small amount of money to the movement’s educational programs, it does not support its roughly 50 congregations, rabbis or mohels. The beautiful, compact campus, which was officially dedicated last week, occupies a strategic spot in the heart of the capital, just a few blocks from Ben-Yehuda Street. Its stone buildings house offices, a synagogue, lecture halls, an auditorium, a cafeteria and a 56-room residence hall. In interviews with the Jewish Week, USCJ’s leadership said the Fuchsberg Jerusalem Center was built, first and foremost, to serve North American Jews spending time in Israel.

“When we built the campus we had three goals, but the primary focus is to help people in the diaspora get the most out of their Israel experience,” said Rabbi Jerome Epstein, USCJ’s executive vice president, just prior to the dedication ceremony.

Rabbi Epstein said that most American Jews are “spiritually divorced” from Israel, and insisted that “we must change that. If there is not a strong diaspora community tied to Israel, then the [will] of that community to help Israel won’t be there.”

Rabbi Epstein said the complex had to be built in order to meet the growing needs of Conservative Jews, who come to Israel with their synagogues, as participants in youth groups and summer programs, and through rabbinical, cantorial and other educational programs.

Prior to the campus’ completion, “we had one small room for any kind of class,” Rabbi Epstein recalled, shaking his head at the memory. “We had eight classes a week, but never at the same time due to lack of space. Now we have 15 classes a week. Now, congregations that come to Israel for two weeks, or youth groups that come will have a home base from which to explore Judaism and Jerusalem.”

Both Rabbi Epstein and Rabbi James Lebeau, the director of the Fuchsberg Center, are certain that the Israeli-based Masorti branch of the Conservative movement will also benefit from the campus’ existence.

“We’ve come to the Masorti movement and said, ‘This can be your home, too,’ ” Rabbi Epstein said, clearly concerned that some Masorti members have expressed disgruntlement over the complex’s cost and mission.

“We have already offered space to the Masorti movement, and we will be cooperating with them as partners,” Rabbi Lebeau said. “We will be cosponsoring a great deal of programming for Israelis, in Hebrew. We’re starting a coffee house that will attract local people.”

The dorm rooms, Rabbi Lebeau said, “will provide a safe location for the youth of our movement from abroad and in Israel. We anticipate that Noam, our Masorti youth movement, will be able to use the facilities for national gatherings, as will Masorti congregations outside of Jerusalem who want to come for study programs in Jerusalem. When we eventually build our last building, it is our intention to invite the Masorti movement to have its headquarters at the Fuchsberg center.”

A Masorti movement rabbi, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said he would like to believe Rabbi Lebeau. “Hopefully these things will come about. Jim Lebeau is a wonderful, kind-hearted person and we know he’ll do his best.”

Even so, the rabbi was critical of the complex at a time when “the Masorti movement is in severe financial distress.” He noted that Conservative rabbis in Israel, who receive half their salary from the movement and the other half from their congregants, “are vastly underpaid. They haven’t received an increase in five years. ”

The rabbi said that Israel-based Conservative institutions — individual congregations, the Schecter Rabbinical College, the Tali school system, the youth and young-adult groups and the Masorti movement itself — “are in competition for funds. Now Schecter is starting a $20 million building campaign as well. Many in the Masorti movement feel there’s something problematic about investing very large sums in erecting buildings when Masorti rabbis are leaving the country because they can’t make a living.”

Many in the Conservative diaspora leadership hope that the new campus will provide the movement with enough visibility to attract Israelis looking for a spiritual home. They hope, too, that the $20 million venture will convince Israeli religious and political officials that Conservative rabbis and institutions deserve to be recognized and funded accordingly.

“The Conservative movement finally has a physical presence in Israel, which says that we’re making an investment in Israel,” said USCJ President Judy Yudof. “This is not just a home away from home for North Americans. I’m confident it will attract the unaffiliated. The Conservative movement has a great deal to offer Israeli Jews, but first they need to know we exist.”

Alan Fuchsberg, who along with his sister Rosalind Fuchsberg Kaufman, donated $5 million toward the campus’s construction, said he was disappointed, though not hurt, that Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski, a fervently Orthodox Jew, “did not feel he could come [to the dedication], so our group went to see him in his office. Maybe 10 years from now, even an Orthodox mayor will feel it is a place he can come to.”

A spokesman for the mayor said that Lupoliansky could not attend the dedication due to a scheduling conflict.

Rabbi Pesach Schinder, who directed the Center for Conservative Judaism, the campus’ predecessor, from 1972 to 1997, agreed that recognition is long overdue. The complex “announces our presence in Jerusalem,” he said. “It says we are here and it is inconceivable that traditional Judaism should be considered outside the pale of Ahavat Yisrael [those who love Israel].

“If you look like a shmatta,” Rabbi Schinder added, “people will treat you like one.”

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