After 70 years of religious oppression, Jewish communities in the Former Soviet Union are being revived. For them to succeed, they need the help and support of established communities, such as our own. Each synagogue within Mosaic twinned with one of these communities aims to help support and sustain the increasing number of Jews who identify with the Progressive Movement. Twinning provides a structure in which information can be shared and friendships forged. Although funds are needed to help these communities to survive, what they really want is to be shown the rituals and what they mean, and to fill in the gaps in history that others sought to erase.
Progressive Jewish Community in Kyiv
Mosaic Liberal Synagogue has been twinned with the Progressive Jewish Community of Kyiv since the late 1990s. This began when their Rabbi, Rabbi Alex Dukhovny, was a student Rabbi at HWPS fifteen years ago under the mentoring of Rabbi Frank Dabba Smith.
Finance is always a problem and the community is heavily reliant on outside help. Every year funds have been raised and donated through the Mosaic Liberal Synagogue High Holy Days appeal and through the Kiev Koppers campaign created by the late Rita Asbury (“z’l”). Since its inception fourteen years ago, the Kiev Koppers scheme has raised £14,500 for their Progressive Jewish Community, all from tiny amounts of money and congregants’ spare change. Much of these funds have supported the continued running of the community’s kindergartens, while regular donations of Jewish ritual items such as Torah scrolls and Judaica from Mosaic Liberal have enabled the community to continue to thrive in its performance of ritual and religious practices.
Under Rabbi Dukhovny’s leadership the community has expanded rapidly. Last year, with the help of financial support from the World Union for Progressive Judaism, it was able to move into new premises, allowing them to develop a wide range of communal activities such as the Netzer youth club and the Jewish Family School.
Rabbi Dabba Smith has taken a group of teenagers from the community to meet teenagers in Ukraine and a group of their teenagers have visited here in return. Rabbi Alex Dukhovny regularly visits Mosaic, and sees it as his home community because of the links he has to us dating back to his years as a rabbinic student.
During the current political upheaval Mosaic Liberal is in constant contact with Rabbi Alex offering support and a shared dark Eastern Jewish humour.
Please contact us for further information about our twinned communities and how to get involved.
