synagogue spotlight
P’nai Or Members
Lose Themselves in Prayer
Jarrad Saff ren | Staff Writer
F 28
APRIL 6, 2023 | JEWISH EXPONENT
P’nai Or members read Torah together.

the community to Zoom. But even
as COVID faded in 2022 and ’23,
a large portion of the congregation
stayed online. The rabbi breaks her
members down into two categories
now: “Zoomers and roomers,” she
said, meaning those who pray online
and those who come to the sanctuary.

There are about 30 Zoomers and 20
roomers each week.

The Zoomers live in Arizona, New
Mexico, New England, Colorado and
other places. Many heard about P’nai
Or through word of mouth. Some were
past congregants who moved away.

The roomers live in Mount Airy, Center
City, Cherry Hill, Bucks County and
other areas. Prager estimates that
membership has grown “a smidge”
during COVID. But at a synagogue with
no property and no school, growth is
not Prager’s goal.

“Our members tend to be empty
nesters or folks whose kids already
graduated from Hebrew school and
are looking for personal, meaningful
Jewish experiences for themselves,”
the rabbi said.

Tobie Hoff man, 69, is a Mount Airy
resident who walks to services. A P’nai
Or member for 30 years, she said that
congregants do not pray. They learn to
“be in prayer.”
“Emotionally, spiritually, physically
being in prayer,” Hoff man added.

“That’s really what I get out of it, and
why I keep going.”
Kohn, a member since 1998,
explained that there are times when
services are “ecstatically joyful” and
times when “it’s very deep and quiet.”
Segura, who is moving to Philadelphia
to be near her daughter, said that,
even over Zoom, she feels like Jewish
songs at the synagogue transport her
“to a place other than the physical
plane.” Pearl, a congregant since 1997,
believes that intentionality and deep
feeling lead to true belief.

“It’s having a deep knowing. It’s not just,
‘Oh, that’s nice. Oh yeah, God expects this
from us.’ It encourages a deep connection
with whatever your concept of God is,”
she explained. “We experience God. We
don’t just pray to God.”
But this process is not just internal.

Zoomers and roomers do it together.

Hoff man is single. Her family members
live in other cities, so she depends on
her fellow synagogue members.

During Yom Kippur, P’nai Or was in
person for the fi rst time since 2019.

Hoff man attended and, at one point,
she looked around the room and
realized that she knew everyone —
and that they all knew her.

“I feel like I’m at home. There’s a
sense of closeness,” she said. “I know
I have people to count on. I do rely on
people here a lot.” ■
jsaff ren@midatlanticmedia.com
Photo by Rabbi Marcia Prager
rank Kohn, 64, is a Mount Airy
resident who walks to Shabbat
services at P’nai Or. Batya
Segura, 66, lives in Florida but attends
via Zoom (though she is in the process
of moving to Philadelphia). And Sharon
Pearl, 70, resides in Cherry Hill, New
Jersey, but travels into the city each
week for Shabbat.

They come from diff erent places
and attend services in diff erent ways.

But for all three members, and more
than 40 others, it’s important to be
at Summit Presbyterian Church, P’nai
Or’s rented sanctuary, every Friday
night. That’s because, as Kohn, Segura
and Pearl explain, the congregation’s
prayer sessions are not about going
through the motions. Rabbi Marcia
Prager directs the service by explaining
the prayers and why congregants are
saying them. Nobody moves too fast,
which enables everybody to under-
stand the words and their meanings,
to feel their connections with God and
to immerse themselves in the moment.

“It’s spiritually alive,” Pearl said.

On Google, P’nai Or describes itself
as Philadelphia’s Jewish Renewal
Community. On Facebook, it refers
to itself as P’nai Or Jewish Renewal
Congregation of Philadelphia. Its goal
is to help Jewish adults deepen their
spirituality, regardless of where they
may be on their Jewish journeys. As
Kohn put it, the congregation of 80
or so members has “people who are
shomer Shabbos and people who light
candles.” It doesn’t matter. There’s no
judgment. There is only a space, now
both virtual and physical, in which
people pray.

The multidimensional nature of
that space developed, as it did at so
many synagogues, during COVID. In
2020, after the pandemic broke out,
Prager transitioned the services and