As a way to connect to your young people and share the magic of camp with the entire community, there are many different ways to make camp part of your Shabbat worship experience. We share a few of our favorites with you.
Temple Shaaray Tefila in New York City uses this logo to promote camp within their congregation, printing it on t-shirts and including it on flyers, emails and in newsletters.
1. Include a camp-themed D’var Torah. Invite a member of your community who can provide a testimonial to the impact of camp: a camper, a parent, former camper, a congregant who has served as a camp staff member, a member of the board, or a Temple staff member who has spent time on faculty at camp.
2. Invite a representative of the camp staff to your congregation to celebrate. Our Directors and Assistant Directors are always happy to visit! They can be available to visit with families before or after services, speak to the congregation as a bimah guest or to help plan your camp Shabbat celebration.
3. Incorporate camp music or creative arts into your worship. Have campers from your congregation work with your Cantor or songleader to choose their favorite songs from camp worship to include in the service. You might event consider inviting a songleader from camp to join your service. Create a camp song list that families can take home with them. Choose a few prayers to highlight and ask campers to interpret them through art, dance or creative reading.
4. Plan a camp-themed Oneg. This will be fun for all ages. S’mores are always a huge hit with the entire congregation! Invite your campers to help plan the menu and participate in serving the food. Create a camp recipe card with fun recipes families can take home with them. Play the camp video as people are coming into the social hall and make the camp brochure or other giveaways available.
5. Create a camp-themed give away. Send families home with a camp-themed care package that might include a flashlight, hat, bug spray or other fun items. Consider printing a t-shirt or hat that says “We love Camp at our Congregation” that your congregants will enjoy wearing.
6. Encourage everyone to wear their camp t-shirt or other camp clothing. Everyone will enjoy the special opportunity to come to temple wearing something different. Hold a contest and give prizes that are camp themed.
7. Create a slideshow or video to show during the service or during an Oneg. Showcase photos or videos of your Temple’s campers in action at camp. This can also be used throughout the year on your website, at youth group events and in religious school classrooms.
8. Make a camp collage. Have congregants, clergy and staff bring old camp photos and display them. This can be a fun game of guess who is who.
9. Invite anyone who will go to/went to a Jewish camp this summer up to the bimah to lead the blessings over candles, wine, and challah. Also take the opportunity to bless them – either that they may have a great summer or in celebration of the great summer they had.
10. Incorporate a camp tradition. Have a Shabbat stroll from the lobby to the sanctuary, or gather for Kabbalat Shabbat and enter the sanctuary together. Teach the congregation Shabbat claps, or provide everyone with a white bandana to teach about wearing white on Shabbat. Get creative and think about ways to share your favorite camp traditions.
11. Hold your Shabbat service outside. Use your congregation’s courtyard or a nearby park. This can be a great opportunity to discuss the importance of nature in Jewish tradition.
12. Crowd source new ideas! Share your thoughts and ideas for bringing camp home to your congregation in the comments below, on our Facebook page or on Twitter (#CampShabbat).
I am sure that many who frequent the Reform Jewish blogosphere are somewhat tired of my frequent and often negative comments about direction in which the Camping movement has influenced Reform Judaism today, and I do not enjoy being known as a “complainer”. Nevertheless, I must question why it is necessary or even desirable to make a concerted effort to re-create the camp experience in our Temple Sanctuaries. Surely, such a move would be appropriate to youth group settings and religious school, but I hope there is nothing controversial in noting that in other modern religious denominations such as mainline and liberal Protestantism, it is expected that children will eventually grow up and no longer require a juvenile aesthetic environment in order to derive spiritual meaning. There is something to be said for re-claiming nature-based spirituality, and there is even more to be said for incorporating deliberate informality as a component of the “restfulness” of Shabbat and its separation from the work week. Nevertheless, I am certain that even this can be expressed in thoroughly adult ways. I certainly don’t think that choirs, organs, robed clergy, dress codes, or the 1940 Union Prayer Book are the only ways to be “adult” Reform Jews, but it would appear that the opposite extreme is considered to be appropriate. I disagree with that, and beg for some kind of balance to be achieved.
Thanks for your feedback, Jordan. The URJ Camp & Israel Programs fully support congregations in their work to help congregants connect to meaningful worship experiences, and we understand each synagogue has its own Shabbat minhagim (traditions). However, finding creative ways to connect congregants to the camp experience–including campers, camp families, prospective camp families, alumni and other interested parties–can prove inspiring and eye-opening for everyone.
While camp-style services are built to engage and be accessible to children, they are not created for or only appreciated by children. Incorporating camp music or creative arts into a worship experience can encourage children and adults alike to form new perspectives and understandings of our prayers, and participating in a nature-based service is an incredible way to reconnect to our earth, Jewish holidays like Tu Bishvat and Jewish values like tikkun olam (repairing the world). You may be interested in reading some of the blog posts below, which detail the powerful camp worship experiences of adult rabbis and educators: Being a Nature Jew, The Magic of a Camp Shabbat & Camp Appreciation Shabbat at Temple Shaaray Tefila.
Of course, we also know and understand that Reform Jews connect to worship in a myriad of ways and we respect the individual preferences of congregants. We hope the spirit of open-mindedness, appropriate experimentation and engagement with Jewish prayers and text we see within our camps and Israel programs is contagious!
If you’d like to speak with me (Leslie Bass, Web Associate) or another URJ Camp & Israel Programs staff member, please don’t hesitate to email us at campweb@urj.org or give us a call at 212-650-4070.