As the dust settles on the recent General Election the campaigns
and result have come in for widespread retrospective scrutiny. Despite living
in the United States, having followed the campaign, I was delighted to be able
to watch the bulk of the results come in live. Seeing the commentators,
as well as many politicians, struggle to make sense of the unanticipated
outcome added to the interest of the evening.
I am a Rabbi, not a political analyst, but I believe the election
results offer a number of important lessons for our work in synagogues.
The day before the election the opinion polls suggested a very
tight race between the Conservatives and Labour. The result proved very
different, with the Conservatives gaining an unexpected overall majority; while
Labour’s 232 seats were significantly lower than forecast. The analysis of the
Labour defeat will continue for some time, with many divergent opinions.
Several commentators have suggested that Labour simply didn’t offer the people
what they wanted; as David Miliband said: “they didn’t want what was being
offered.”
In synagogues we may have many programs we want to offer, but the
leadership, especially the Rabbis, need to be conscious that what we want to
offer may not be what our members want to receive. We need to meet people where
they are, not where we want them to be. They will ultimately “vote” with their
feet so we need to be conscious of what they want, and what we are willing and
able to do within our understanding of Judaism and synagogue life. Otherwise just
like Labour we could see many more empty seats.
The other major loser was clearly the Liberal Democrats, crashing
to 8 seats; they are now a shell of their former selves. Their defeat, as Nick
Clegg acknowledged, appeared to be as a result of their entry into the
Coalition; it is likely that without their support the Conservatives would have
been unable to govern for a full term; the Liberal Democrats kept the
institution standing at tremendous cost to themselves and to the
dissatisfaction of their members.
Often in synagogues we expend significant amounts of energy in
protecting structures and programs because that is the way it has always been.
We need to be aware that times change and if our members no longer want such
programs we have to be willing to think differently. Programs and activities
desired by synagogue members in the 1980s are not necessarily what people want
today. Refusing to be flexible may mean our members become unhappy and desert
the synagogue.
Despite gaining 12.6% of the national vote, UKIP were still
losers, gaining only one seat; their result stands in contrast to the focused
SNP who received 56 seats for just 4.7% of the national vote. This
reminds us in our synagogues that we need to be focused, we cannot do
everything at once, and if we want to be successful in bringing about change it
needs to be gradual with a step-by-step approach.
The success of the SNP offers other lessons; coming hot on the
heels of their defeat in the recent referendum on Scottish independence (a
reminder that we need to be prepared to fail forward). The people of Scotland
voted to remain part of the union, but they then voted, en masse, for the
nationalist party at the next opportunity. They remind us that we have
significant numbers of people who want to remain part of our synagogue
communities, but also want to have their say on the direction those communities
are going in.
Finally, the biggest winners were the Conservatives; despite the
polls suggesting it would be a challenging night for David Cameron the public
gave them an overall majority. Since the election people have talked about “shy
Tories”, people who didn’t want to share their Conservative support with
pollsters.
We can ask people what they want from their synagogues, but they
won’t always tell us the whole truth. Telling the Rabbi that you don’t like the
format of Shabbat services or aren’t interested in adult education can be
difficult, and advocating for major changes can be overwhelming. In the words
of Isaac Bashevis Singer “we know what a person thinks not when they tell us
what they think, but by their actions.” People come to the synagogue events and
programs they want to and ignore the ones that are of no interest. Rather than
listening to the polls we have to see what works and what doesn’t work, it is
essential that we communicate with our communities.
The General Election might not
have been intended as a lesson about synagogues, but it offers some important
insights. We might not have an election to worry about, but if we don’t listen
we might very soon find ourselves out of office.
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