I am so grateful to find this discussion group. Life here is really difficult, lonely and sad sometimes. I am so happy that I can converse with like minded people on the internet. Let me first tell you some of the trials I have had to endure here and then I will give you a bit of the Jewish here.

I am the last bastion of Traditional Judaism in the area, and although my struggle is hard I won’t give up. My back ground is Sephard, and is the tradition I follow. My particular family has been in this area for a few hundred years and were some of the early founders and settlers whenthe Wheeling, WV area was considered the western end of the civilized US. I am scorned by the local community which has become 99.9% Reform. I have been ridiculed for going to a mikveh, keeping my head covered, keeping kosher, studying Torah, etc… Anything that is viewed as remotely traditional is scoffed.

My parents live south of Wheeling, where we had a farm that produced eggs when I was a child. There were once many shuls in the area. The one we went to was of course Sephardi. When the membership dwendled to 13 we merged with the Orthodox shul Agudas Achim across the river in Bellaire, Oh. In 1986 their shul was slated to be demolished for a new highway and because membership also droped significantly due to death and children moving away we merged with the reform Temple Shalom.  Over the years the conservative Sons of Israel and another reform group all merged with Temple Shalom. The reform group once had a beautiful shul downdown, but they wanted to be in a more chic location. So they tore the old shul down and filled in the area’s only mikveh with cement.

You can probably imagine that with so many various groups merged into one there was no shalom there. One of the conditions with the merger of Agudas Achim with the reform shul was that it was to maintain its separate identity and that Shabbat Morning Services were to be traditional. Our numbers further dropped and traditional Shabbat Morning Services were no longer held. Also all assets, including our Torah Scrolls and Aaron Codesh were taken by the reform group. (I don’t know what they need with 10 Torah Scrolls and 4 stored Arcs, but they wouldn’t even sell our Arc and two scrolls back.) When this occured in 1999 a small group of us left and formed a group called Kol Ami with 8 members. Sadly all but myself have passed away since then. I was the youngest member and am currenty 36. I vowed that I would maintain a traditional presence in the area and “hold up the fort” so to speak.

Today I typically pray alone. Sometimes my parents, siblings, (both of which aren’t very observant anymore) or someone that has moved away will show up for prayer. One of the big chain grocery stores has a good kosher section since the reform shul does have about 300 members, but somethings (especially meats) I either travel to Pittsburgh PA or have shipped in.

I am very glad I was able to tell you about the area I am located in and hope that I can continue to tell eveyone about myself.

Interesting discussion of protecting observance in a small community.  There are a lot of different responses and sources for this.  First, the OU held a forum for member synagogues in small communities in September.  They were supposed to record the symposium and sell the tapes.  A second resource would be Lubavitch which sends emmissaries to numerous communities where their people are the only observant Jews for miles around but are expected to have a beneficial influence on elevating the level of Jewish living, and for the most part do.  There is a cynical side which I think also comes from the Rebbe. Apologies in advance if my source is in error.  Among his letters was a response to the wife of a dentist stationed north of the Arctic Circle who asked when shabbos should be observed in the absence of the sun’s rising and setting.  Rather that cite astronomy or Talmud, his advice went something like “there are some places where Jews should not live.”

In Delaware we have a variant of these themes.  Our community has one synagogue of each of the major denominations.  People are labelled by their synagogue preference, which probably harms the Conservatives more than the others since the upper tier of families fulfilling what the CJ brass thinks they should go to the traditional shul and the membership of the Conservative and Reform congregations overlap considerably in ideology and practice.  There is an orthodox element and our clergy have orthodox ordination as required by bylaws.  But the mechitza was untenable by the 1950’s and eventually my shul could no longer satisfy revisions in OU’s congregational requirements and was evicted.  We do what we can.  When the Kosher butcher went belly up some fifteen years ago our rabbi was at the forefront of setting up an agreement with a local supermarket for meat cutting, deli and bakery, all of which presently thrive.  Some like myself become OU individual members.

The more intriguing issue is not the rise and fall of observance and institutions in our area but their future.  While we cannot support a mechitza, we can rally around a special event that requires one, whether a visiting dignitary or a bar mitzvah family with out of town guests who are used to this.  Yet if we tried this as our norm we would disappear.  Some day the same might be the case for egalitarianism.  Maybe our survival depends on a Hillel model with a mechitza service in one room and an egalitarian one of identical liturgy someplace else in the building.  The real problem arises when there are parallel services without liturgical parity.  Then you create stronger and weaker forms of Judaism.  The Conservatives seem to be paying very dearly for having done that decades ago to expand enrollment, but now find that they have neither enrollment nor widespread synagogue skills.  The real problem of sustaining observance without the critical mass needed to secure this is where to introduce leniencies without causing serious harm that shortchanges the next generation.

furrydoc

Just spent 7 months in Charleston WV where I frequented Cong. Bnai Jacob, a “traditional” congregation. Fortunately for BJ, there is a reform congregation in town so while there is some pull toward less observance, Shabat morning services are mostly “modern orthodox.” People who want reform have it down the street so they don’t pull BJ toward reform.
Like you, I follow Sephard (specifically Moroccan) minhag and find that as long as I pray quietly, no one at Ashkenazi congregations objects (too much). Chabad’s Nusach HaAri sedur is close to my Messas sedur. Finding Sephardi/Mizrachi congregations in the US still is difficult.
What do you do for kadish yatom?

Dear bryanbebe,
It’s only a year and a month late!  I can understand and commiserate with your plight as my mother came from a small town in Illinois.  I wanted to invite you to Columbus, Ohio for any and all Shabbat that you wish.  I have a spare bedroom for a woman and a friend will have hospitality for men.  We daven nusach s’fard, and I have a very good friend who is an wonderful S’fard cook.

Reply here and we can get in touch.
Kori