Some Baltimoreans are taking every opportunity they can get to spend time outside this summer — including during Shabbat services.
Synagogues across the Baltimore area are stepping outside of the sanctuary and holding their services in the great outdoors, creating more casual Shabbat services that allow congregants to connect with nature.
Beth El Congregation in Baltimore is starting a new version of its Summer Shabbat Series, holding outdoor Saturday morning services on July 15, 22 and 29. The synagogue stresses that these services are meant to be casual in nature. “Don’t put on your tie or your heels, think short sleeves and flip flops,” reads the events’ promotional materials. Instead of sitting at benches and pews, congregants are encouraged to bring beach chairs and blankets.
“This is our first real attempt at doing outdoor Shabbat services on a regular basis on Saturdays,” said Ben Wachstein, Beth El’s executive director. “We’re trying to create a different, more casual feeling for these services.”
The Summer Shabbat Series is primarily meant to appeal to families with young children. As such, the services are held next to the synagogue’s playground, giving the children the chance to play while their parents engage with the services themselves. All will be able to enjoy the scenery of Generations Park and the Weil-Mandel Pavilion, which was built for outdoor Shabbat services.
“[Outdoor services] allow people to connect more with their surroundings, with nature,” Wachstein explained. “When you’re outside and you can look up at the sky while praying, there’s a different sensibility that comes with that. For some people, it might be a distraction, but for others it can provide a new sense of spirituality and soulfulness.”
Temple Isaiah in Fulton has been holding outdoor services for many years, with its rabbi, Rabbi Craig Axler, estimating that the outdoor services started 11 or 12 years ago. He noted that Temple Isaiah’s 23-acre campus is surrounded by nature, which its staff wanted to take advantage of with programming that incorporated the surroundings.
“When we’re in the middle of services, we’ll do a silent meditation portion, and you can hear the frogs and the birds and the wind all around you,” Axler said. “The sun is setting and nature surrounds you. It’s an extraordinary experience of prayer.”
Axler used to work at a Reform summer camp — URJ Camp Harlam in Kunkletown, Pennsylvania — that held outdoor Shabbat services on Fridays and Saturdays, weather permitting.
“That experience of prayer at camp, which for many people is an extraordinarily special memory, is replicated to some degree,” he added. “It’s one of the ways that the camp experience particularly has shaped what the synagogue does, and what’s successful in the modern synagogue.”
He added that attending a Jewish summer camp can be a meaningful and formative experience for young Jewish people, and that he wants to emulate that feeling in Temple Isaiah’s outdoor services.
“Some people will say that they loved services at camp, but that services at a synagogue aren’t the same,” Axler said. “We try to build that same sort of positive association.”
For Bolton Street Synagogue, its outdoor Shabbat services in its meadow are a selling point. During July and August, the congregation holds all of its Friday Shabbat services outside, provided that the weather allows for it.
Marc Wernick, one of the members-at-large on the synagogue’s board, agrees that outdoor services can provide a different experience than indoor ones.
“Of course, I feel closer to the divine and it’s a bit more intimate inside,” he said. “But there’s something very tangible about being outside in the grass … feeling the presence of spirituality all around you.”
He added that Bolton Street Synagogue’s focus on inclusive services, where anyone can participate and where the lack of a cantor means that anyone can lead, helps to make these moments feel special. Congregants are not only communing with nature during outdoor services but growing closer to each other through this shared experience.
“Many people at Bolton Street Synagogue have different perceptions of God,” Wernick noted. “If you talk to some of our members, they feel less of a traditional sense of God and more of a feeling of a universal spirit. I can only speak for myself personally, but being together with everyone on the patio makes me feel closer to the others and closer to that sense of spirituality.”
