Congregation Beth El invites you to join us for a spiritually uplifting start to the New Year. 

We offer a wide array of High Holy Day programming to serve the diverse needs of our community, beginning with Rosh Chodesh (the new moon of) Elul, thirty days before Rosh Hashanah. The season formally begins with S’lichot on Saturday, September 21, and continues through Sukkot and Simchat Torah.

Ticket registration is now open! Sign up online to join us!

Here is the full schedule of services!

The Birthday of the World

the birthday of the world
I begin to contemplate
what I have done and left
undone, but this year
not so much rebuilding

of my perennially damaged
psyche, shoring up eroding
friendships, digging out
stumps of old resentments
that refuse to rot on their own.

No, this year I want to call
myself to task for what
I have done and not done
for peace. How much have
I dared in opposition?

How much have I put
on the line for freedom?
For mine and others?
As these freedoms are pared,
sliced and diced, where

have I spoken out? Who
have I tried to move? In
this holy season, I stand
self-convicted of sloth
in a time when lies choke

the mind and rhetoric
bends reason to slithering
choking pythons. Here
I stand before the gates
opening, the fire dazzling

my eyes, and as I approach
what judges me, I judge
myself. Give me weapons
of minute destruction. Let
my words turn into sparks.

Marge Piercy, "The Birthday of the World" from The Crooked Inheritance. Copyright © 2006.

​​The High Holy Days, from Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kippur, bracket ten days given to us to reflect on our lives: How do we use the time we are given? Are we realizing our most authentic selves? What is our accountability and responsibility to self, others and God? We are called during this season to cheshbon ha-nefesh—a searching examination of our lives, that we may gain renewed strength and commitment for the tasks before us: tikkun atzmi—repairing self and tikkun olam—repairing the world.
Please join your presence, your voice and your intentions with those of our community at Beth El’s High Holy Days this year.

Please review the information on the About Services page—especially the description of the new format of our early services— to learn what’s new and different for this New Year, as well as all the other details of our exciting, inspiring, and meaningful High Holy Day season at Beth El.
 

Ticket registration is now open! Sign up online to join us!