Eighty years ago this week, six independent Reform congregations decided to create formal links by establishing a joint organisation.

The timing was dictated by the Second World War and a desire to provide for the Jewish education of children who had been evacuated across the country — most without their families.

A national problem needed a national response and so representatives of the West London, Manchester, Bradford, Settlement, North Western Reform and Glasgow synagogues met for the first time.

It quickly became apparent that they had much else in common. A further meeting was arranged and plans were drawn up for a much wider remit, including founding new congregations and establishing a Reform Beit Din. With hindsight, this was not only an obvious development but, bearing in mind that the first Reform synagogue had been founded in 1840, astonishingly overdue. Why did it take over a century for them to get together? The answer lies in their fiercely autonomous nature.

Back in 1942, the name of the new organisation was the remarkably bland Associated British Synagogues (ABS), suggesting the desire not to imply any limit on that autonomy.

Within four years, it had grown by 50 per cent with three more congregations (Edgware, Leeds and Bournemouth) and renamed itself the Association of Synagogues of Great Britain (ASGB). The loose adjective (Associated) had become a concrete noun (Association) telling the world that a new religious group had arrived.

There was another more delicate reason behind the change. The ABS was a wartime baby and deliberately accentuated its patriotism. The need for such a declaration ceased post-war and anyway, the movement had many members who did not yet have British status. However, the new name did not reflect its religious orientation, the result of a fierce ideological battle.

On the one side were those rabbis and lay leaders (led by Rabbi Harold Reinhart) who saw Reform as thoroughly part of Jewish tradition and needing no distinctive description. The other side was led by Rabbi Werner van der Zyl, who felt it important to highlight that Reform synagogues were offering a form of Judaism substantially different from Orthodox.

The latter side prevailed so another name change occurred in 1958, the movement becoming the Reform Synagogues of Great Britain (RSGB) — a clear assertion of religious identity and increasing self-confidence. It now comprised 16 communities.

Growth continued both in size and in a wider structure far beyond local congregational life with a youth movement, rabbinic seminary (Leo Baeck College, run jointly with the Liberals), day schools, burial society and student chaplaincy. This led to yet another name change in 2005 to the Movement for Reform Judaism.

The institutional progress was also manifested in involvement in British Jewry at large, with Reform playing a key role in all its major organisations. As former movement head Rabbi Tony Bayfield once put it: “We have a seat the top table” — a far cry from the days of exclusion.

A fifth change took place in the transition to RJ, or Reform Judaism, from 2016 — a snappier title for the internet age. And investment in such technology proved highly beneficial when Covid-19 struck, enabling individual synagogues and the central organisation to continue functioning in lockdown. Members and non-members took advantage of Reform’s online services, study sessions and cultural activities. But its communities need subscription-paying supporters to survive.

The movement has also suffered from the lack of a chief executive or senior rabbi for the past 18 months. Although many others have worked hard to maintain its functions, like any organisation it needs a firm hand at the top to guide it.

What seems clear is that Reform’s willingness to adapt to changing circumstances will continue. Recent moves have seen inclusive language in our prayer book, accepting diversity in sexual identity, the championing of the need to protect the environment and reaching out to mixed-faith couples.

Unlike its staid first century, in the 80 years since it became a national movement Reform Judaism has been bursting with creativity. Rooted in tradition but responding to change, the once new kid on the block is firmly part of British Jewry. It might even change its name again.

Jonathan Romain is rabbi of Maidenhead Synagogue and author of ‘The Jews of England’