HONORING OUR HERITAGE AND SECURING OUR FUTURE
Together, we begin our next journey.
Together, we celebrate our remarkable legacy.
Together, we build a future for our community.
Together, we invest in people, projects, and places that will inspire an extraordinary shared future.
Together, anything is possible.
We come to connect - to pray, to reflect, to heal, to learn, to renew our traditions and ourselves.
For 150 years, Temple Emanuel has supported and inspired the Denver Jewish community. Now is the moment to build our shared future - to launch a vision for Temple Emanuel that is crucial and compelling for generations to come. The 150th Anniversary Campaign invites all of us to invest in our community, to preserve our heritage, and to sustain a sacred institution that is whole for future generations.
Temple Emanuel's 150th Anniversary Campaign focuses on two essential areas which will help us honor our Jewish heritage and secure our future for the next 150 years.
- Ensure support for vital leadership roles and programs that will strengthen and sustain the life of our Jewish community.
- Create inspiring spaces that are comforting, safe and welcoming to all.
We are committed to deepening life's journeys through a Jewish lens, ensuring the financial future of the congregation, securing essential space and technology, engaging the diversity of our entire sacred community, and growing our leadership to serve our congregation and community.
Temple Emanuel's 150th Anniversary Campaign will help us expand our reach, sustain our legacy, modernize our infrastructure, and serve the needs of our community and our neighbors.
THE CAMPAIGN: A TORAH FOR TOMORROW
From generation to generation, Torah connects us to our past and emboldens us for the future. The story of our people and the foundation of our values, Torah sustains us and guides us. In honor of our 150th Anniversary, we have commissioned a new Torah scroll - a Torah for Tomorrow. Our new Torah will be a lasting reminder of our 150th Anniversary Celebration and a spiritual connection to the role of Torah in our lives, and that of our synagogue. Your gift will make our future stories happen. Every gift to this campaign writes a story. Our gift societies reflect our dedication to the Torah at the center of this community.
Gift levels will be recognized as:
Scribe Society - $1,000,000 and above
Book Society - $500,000 to $999,999
Portion Society - $250,000 to $499,999
Column Society - $100,000 to $249,999
Chapter Society - $50,000 to $99,999
Sentence/Verse Society - $10,000 to $49,999
Word Society - $5,000 to $9,999
Letter Society - $150 to $4,999
Gifts over $10,000 can be paid over three (3) years; Gifts over $250,000 can be paid over five (5) years.
A LETTER FROM OUR LEADERSHIP
Dear Temple Emanuel Community,
Temple Emanuel is more than a place. It is our legacy, our memories, our cultural and spiritual home, and our community. For 150 years, we have shared moments of joy and difficulty with one another. We have created a congregation that reflects our values and propels our dreams.
Each of us feels so blessed to lead and be a part of this community. We feel the strength of our heritage, and we honor the tremendous courage of those who came before us. And now, we invite you to join us as we envision our future.
We know that Temple Emanuel will continue to play a fundamental role in the holy project of L'dor Vador - passing our Jewish values on to the next generation. The 150th Anniversary Campaign: Lighting our Legacy helps us all to do this - together.
We are excited to embark on a Senior Rabbi leadership transition as we capture the energy of our 150th Anniversary Year. From one generation of Senior Rabbis to another - from Rabbi Foster to Rabbi Black to Co-Senior Rabbis Hyatt and Sacks, we will work together to uphold both the solidity and the creativity that have always been the hallmark of our congregation.
future.
What do we all see for our future at Temple Emanuel? We see a community that holds us up and stewards us through our hardest moments; where people feel connected to each other in Judaism's embrace and are guided by deep relationships with their clergy. We see a community which values strength of voice, depth of impact, and meaningful change in our own community and in our lived experiences. We see a community where we find holiness in each other, our sacred spaces, and in the connection to something larger than ourselves that has sustained our people for generations.
We see a community where Judaism inspires our lives - where everyday miracles lift us in our highest moments and bring us together into the future.
Please join us in this holy endeavor.
Sincerely,
Your Temple Emanuel Leadership Team
MORE ABOUT THE NEW TORAH
Ancient Rituals, New Traditions
In Deuteronomy 31:19, Moses speaks to the Israelites at the end of his life and tells them: “Now, write down these words and teach them to the Children of Israel – put them into their mouths.” From this, our sages concluded that every one of us is responsible to actually write a Sefer Torah. This is considered to be the 613th – or very last -commandment in the Torah. Most of us do not possess the skills to take pen to parchment and write. We can, however, participate in a communal effort to create a new scroll for our community.
About the Scribe
The Hebrew word for a scribe of Jewish sacred texts used in ritual life is sofer (masculine) or soferet (feminine). Soferim are specifically scribes who can create sacred scrolls, tefillin, mezuzot and other religious writings. Although these scribes have transcribed the same texts by hand over and over for thousands of years, they are not merely copyists. Rather, soferim are highly trained specialists who apprentice with senior scribes for years to learn the art and tradition of scribing Jewish texts. Their work is beautiful and ornate, with each scribe developing their own style of calligraphy – almost as unique as a textual fingerprint. However, the most complex part of becoming a Jewish scribe is not perfecting one’s calligraphy or mastering the use of a quill and ink, but rather learning the thousands of laws that apply to the many different types of texts written on parchment.
We have commissioned a new Torah scroll to be created by Jen Kamenetz, a member of the female-only Stam Scribes collective. Jen has studied Jewish texts for many years in a variety of settings, and scribing brings together her love of those texts and the rich, layered world of Hebrew letters and language. In 2014, she began studying sofrut with Jen Taylor, the first woman known to have completed a Torah scroll. We are honored that Jen Kamenetz will write her first full sefer Torah for Temple Emanuel Denver. The Torah we create together will embody our profound reverence for our religious traditions and texts with our deep commitment to building an inclusive and expansive Jewish community for the future – it is truly a Torah for Tomorrow.
ANNIVERSARY BOOK AND DOCUMENTARY
Temple Emanuel: A Celebration of Us!
“Temple Emanuel: A Celebration of Us!" is a beautiful and informative book covering Temple Emanuel's history from 1974 to 2024. It is both a comprehensive written history and a gorgeous coffee table book with photos curated by the 150th Anniversary History Committee. This book is a labor of love, written by Leslie Schaeffer and designed with significant help from Sharon Elfenbein, Danny Foster, Barry Hirschfeld, Trina Reisch, Suzi Scher, and Patricia Winter.
Copies of the commemorative 150th anniversary book, "Temple Emanuel: A Celebration of Us!", is available for order online and for purchase at the Sisterhood Gift Shop. Books must be picked up by the purchaser at Temple Emanuel. Read on for more information about picking up your copy.
Heritage, Harmony, Home - 150th Anniversary Documentary
Temple Emanuel's documentary commemorating the congregation's 150 years of rich history.
A Loclyz Media Services Production - https://loclyz.com
Produced and Written by Pat Woodard
Executive Producers - Danny Foster, Donald Yale
Coordinating Producer - Sharon Levy Freed
Supervising Producer - Mike Harrity
