After Years of Wandering, the Faithful Find a Home

Many of them wandered in search of escape until discovering a path that led, finally, to each other. Some had abandoned Judaism; others felt they were cast aside. Today, the members of this predominately gay and lesbian congregation come home.

Congregation Kol Ami--which means “voice of my people”--will dedicate its new home today in West Hollywood, completing a 10-year process of raising funds and then more funds, traipsing in and out of escrow and, time and again, beginning its search anew.

The synagogue, in a redevelopment zone on a narrow corner lot at La Brea and Lexington, reflects the unique nature of its membership’s faith, traditions and values, says Rabbi Denise Eger. The Hebrew words for peace and justice are written large against the building’s concrete exterior.

Driven by a spirit of inclusion as well as its involvement in social and political issues, Kol Ami is West Hollywood’s only Reform synagogue and is in an area dominated by Orthodox sanctuaries. It is unique in its emphasis on diversity, a blending of races, straights and gays, says Eger.

“We believe in the strength of community. We have never wanted to be a gay-only synagogue,” Eger says. “We want to be reflective of our lives, and we all have straight family and friends who are an integral part of our lives.”

Kol Ami dates back to 1992, when a difference in vision prompted 38 members to split from Beth Chayim Chadashim, believed to be the nation’s first synagogue formed specifically to serve the gay and lesbian community.

Their first service was in a member’s home and drew 70 people. Soon after, they started renting space at West Hollywood Presbyterian Church.

There was a sense of excitement in striking out on their own, says Eger, who had been rabbi at Beth Chayim Chadashim for four years, but it was only a sliver of light in terrifying darkness.

“I did a lot of funerals at a young age,” says Eger, 41. “The AIDS crisis made me realize how fragile and very tenuous life is. It made my commitment to family and family life for gay people that much stronger.”

In 1988, Eger started the first Jewish HIV/AIDS support group in the Los Angeles area. There were about 10 core members of the group, most of whom have since died.

“Rick and Alan and Michael,” she says, thinking back. “They were my teachers.”

One member of that group, a 50-year-old college professor, says he had just moved to Los Angeles from the Bay Area when he heard about the group.

A friend encouraged him to attend a meeting, and in his quest for support, he was reconnected to his faith.

“That’s the story for many of us,” he says.

“What Rabbi Eger has done for us is reconnect us with tradition. I wasn’t looking for a synagogue, but she was so incredible. She welcomed us and said that we would, together, go on this journey. She gave us hope.”

Ordained in 1988, Eger is among the first generation of openly gay rabbis. There are, she says, about 16 predominantly gay and lesbian synagogues in the country.

She was instrumental in Reform Judaism’s acceptance of same-sex marriage ceremonies and is writing the liturgy to be used for such ceremonies in Reform synagogues internationally.

She understands the loneliness many members encountered in their lives, the loneliness of being different. Included in the new synagogue is space for children, where once a week, they can discuss Jewish tradition, Hebrew and issues related to nontraditional families.

“We teach them about all kinds of families, the rainbow of diversity,” Eger says.

“Kids who have two moms or two dads or are part of single-parent families, they know they’re different, and I think many of them are happy to have one place in life where they know they’re not alone.”

Nine years after the congregation started looking for a place to build, one of the few remaining undeveloped lots for commercial use in West Hollywood appeared on the market. It was a corner patch of weeds surrounded by chain link.

Among the first to consider it was Marianne Lowenthal, a member of the Kol Ami building committee, treasurer of the congregation and, fittingly, a real estate developer.

“When you start out with no money and no place of your own and want to build, it can be a very difficult process,” says Lowenthal. “When we first started looking, we hadn’t raised the money. I can’t tell you how many times the rabbi told me to have faith, that it would be OK.”

Turns out, the rabbi was right. Final cost was $2.4 million. There has been great support, says Eger, not only from members but also from a larger constituency whose ties to the synagogue are based more on culture than faith. About 750 people attended this year’s Yom Kippur service.

They knew they wanted to be in West Hollywood, says Lowenthal, and they knew they wanted more than a roof over their heads. They wanted a home that would serve as an integral symbol and institution.

They interviewed several architects, settling on Josh Schweitzer, an unlikely choice. Schweitzer, whose design sensibilities lean toward simplicity and unity, had no knowledge of synagogues or, for that matter, places of worship. Early on in the process, he had his own type of religious “coming out.”

“When I was interviewing with them, I told them, ‘I think it’s important that you understand that I’m an atheist. I do not believe in a godlike figure. I believe in the spirit of mankind.’ I felt it was important that they know that.”

Among his credits are the Border Grill restaurants in Santa Monica and Las Vegas, Ciudad restaurant in downtown Los Angeles and the Monument House, a retreat in Joshua Tree National Monument. In the back of his mind, however, he was intrigued by the prospects of a synagogue.

“Every building I’ve done, I’ve approached in the same kind of way,” he says, “I want it to be a meaningful spiritual experience for the occupant, whether it’s a retail space for the the people who work there or the customers or whether it’s an office space. It’s important that the building speaks to them in a meaningful way, that it resonates with their own spirit.”

A phrase he heard time and again was that members did not want it be like their parents’ synagogues. They wanted it to be more in line with contemporary life, yet anchored in Jewish tradition.

The work involved blending secular aspects of the building with the sanctuary, “a place,” says Schweitzer, “for people to sit and find God.”

They broke ground a year ago this weekend, and today at 1:30 p.m., members of the congregation will gather a block away from the synagogue to begin a ceremonial procession to their new home.

They will enter through a courtyard beneath a window framed by verses from the Torah. Inside, high upon the walls, wrapping around the sanctuary, are more words, written in Hebrew: Love, holiness, commandment, joy, compassion, justice, blessing, eternal, understanding, faith.

They will place the scrolls in the ark, where they will be kept near the Jewish star and eternal light, which serves as a reminder of God’s presence and represents the light of the ancient temple.

There will be speeches and readings, the sounds of children, music and laughter. And, finally, for many who have wandered, there will be a sense of place.