Rabbi's Week in Review Blog

This past Shabbat, we held a special service to celebrate the first anniversary of Ga’avah KC, Kansas City’s Jewish LGBTQ+ organization. We were honored and proud to be the synagogue in town hosting the Jewish LGBTQ+ community. It is so much of who we are and want to be as a synagogue.

Our thanks to Brad Ordo, chair of Ga’avah and a Kol Ami board member, for his wonderful work in establishing Ga’avah and connecting us to Ga’avah. Thank you to our guest musician, Carol Steinel, for sharing her music and telling her story through her music. Also, thank you to our music director, Lara Steinel, for putting together the music that was so meaningful. And a thanks to our board and our volunteers for giving us such a beautiful service and representing us so well as the most welcoming shul.

I heard a lot of good things about us on Friday night. What I was most gratified to hear were comments that no other synagogue had addressed the queer community in such an open and forthright way. No other shul in town had been as assertive in presenting as a shul for the Jewish LGBTQ+ community. We want to be the place where the LGBTQ+ community has a voice and an impact on the vision of the congregation.

I am excited about our future at Congregation Kol Ami. I am excited about our future standing with and for Kansas City’s Jewish LGBTQ+ community. I am grateful for the community sharing last Shabbat — a meaningful and important night for our Kol Ami family.