SOUTH SHORE JEWISH COMMUNITY

WELCOME

My name is Laurence Herscu. I am the current president of the South Shore Jewish Community, a community now 15 years old and consisting of approximately 120 families. A rare mixture of Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews, many of us originate from different parts of the world and speak French, English, Hebrew, and several other languages.
The purpose of this web site is to give the general public on the South Shore an opportunity to learn more about our community and, hopefully, to attract new members.

Laurence Herscu

History of the community

	Having lived on the South Shore for 30 years, Walter Lee believed he was the only Jew in the region.
WALTER LEE Founding President
A chance encounter, however, with a Chabadnick in a renovation superstore became his inspiration to search for other Jews. The rest is history. Walter Lee became the Founding President of the South Shore Jewish Community. " Our community is rather heterogeneous with a lot of mixed marriages," he wrote in a letter dating back to 1995. "People haven't taken a great interest in Jewish culture, but in their hearts, as in my own, I feel a desire to return to our roots and to our culture. It's a difficult challenge, but with G-d's help, we will succeed." The first event organized by the community was a Chanukah party in 1994 that attracted 35 people. By July 1995, we had 141 people on our membership list. Since 2003, our community centre has been located in La Prairie (La Citière), where we have our own kosher kitchen, a beautifully crafted Ark and bimah, as well as two Sefer Torahs (permanent loans from the Cummings Centre for Seniors and the Beth Israel Ohef Shalom congregation). Services take place essentially on Rosh Chodesh and the high holydays in the Conservative tradition, but we have no official affiliation. This year, we will celebrate our 12th annual community seder. We also organize other cultural and social events. Bagel breakfasts with speakers on Jewish current affairs have been particularly popular, and we also offer weekly Hebrew classes for both adults and children.

The South Shore Jewish Community is highly diverse, to say the least. Many of us are immigrants from Morocco, Egypt, Israel, France, the U.K., and eastern Europe. For most of our members, our organization is their principle connection to Judaism. Our sources of financing are a generous grant from FEDERATON CJA, membership fees, individual donations, and fundraising events. We have representation at the CJC, the Council of Synagogues of Greater Montreal and the CSUQ.
The Canadian Zionist Federation keeps us posted on activities in Montreal and we communicate with members of our community through our monthly bulletin and an active telephone committee.
The Jewish Public Library is an important resource for many of us. Some of the older members of our community are members of the Cummings Centre for Seniors.
The thirteen members of our Board of Directors, and the many volunteers on sub-committees, are dedicated to preserving our Jewish heritage on the South Shore.
All our meetings are conducted in both official languages. Due to the diversity of our origins and experiences within Judaism, satisfying the expectations of each and every member, while at the same time integrating non-Jewish spouses or partners, has been a real challenge. Yet this is what we have succeeded in doing so successfully for the past ten years and at this point in time, we can draw on our own history and move forward.
Our responsibility as proud representatives of Judaism among our non-Jewish neighbours is sometimes all the greater as we are often the only Jews in the neighbourhood, and we take this responsibility very seriously. We continue to try to sensitize Jews who live on Montreal's South Shore and we are more than willing to help them link up once again with Judaism and our common heritage.