It is not the spiritual traditions of synagogue that Manchester Reform’s Rabbi Robyn Ashworth-Steen misses the most — it’s the informal, down-to-earth ones.
The city centre shul in Jackson’s Row held its last in-person Shabbat service the Friday before the first lockdown was announced a year ago and has not reopened since.
And while Rabbi Ashworth-Steen’s congregants have reaped the benefits of online provision, she acknowledged that there were some things that could not be properly replicated on Zoom.
“What do I miss? Gosh, I miss the messiness of being in the community in person. The things that go wrong in a service are usually the most beautiful and life-affirming things that just show us we’re human.
“What I find hard about doing it online is that everything is so perfect in a way. There’s no extra sound, the tech works very well, it generally goes very smoothly.
“I just miss the messiness and the energy of just being physically with people — and being able to read the energy and really support people when they’re in moments of need.
“I think it’s much harder to do when you’re on a screen.”
The rabbi added that the impact of the pandemic could be felt throughout the congregation, from the “real toll” it’s taken on children and teens — an issue she has witnessed first-hand as a parent — to older members wary of “becoming one of those Zoom people” or not understanding digital technology.
And there have been deaths, a “high number” of them from Covid.
“There’s a deep sadness that we can’t be together, I think particularly around bereavements. We had a lot of bereavements at the beginning of the first lockdown.
“We’re coming now to the unveilings, the stone-settings, of those people a year later. And we’re still at a stage where we could only have six people at the stone-setting.
“That’s really hard. Because I remember standing in the cemetery and saying this time next year, hopefully, we can come back in bigger numbers.”
The positive aspect was how her community had “come to life” over the past year, with services feeling more egalitarian and interactive.
Whereas in shul, Rabbi Ashworth-Steen would be looking down on congregants from the bimah, members were now engaging using a virtual Torah scroll reader and reacting to the proceedings in the Zoom chat.
“The challenge will be how do you bring that intimacy and that interactivity together [in person]?”
For now, the shul has no plans to reopen — a decision, said the rabbi, that was made “partly through listening to our members’ needs. They are scared of being in a small space that is not super well-ventilated.
“And actually, to go back into synagogue [and] be masked up, not be able to talk to each other, not being able to sing with each other and being distanced, would be a few steps back from what we’re able to do online.”
