dsg@mhuxi.UUCP (David S. Green) (12/05/84)
From Ken Wolman
Bell Communications Research
Now On System whuxi!ktw
(Il Ghetto Nuovo di Belcuore)
RE: The Bingo Trap, Fundraising, and Shul Money
I read with interest Toby Robison's comments about bingo as
a synagogue fundraising method, mainly because I am on the
Board of Trustees of a synagogue (Conservative) which
derives a significant portion ($45-50,000) of its annual
budget from running a twice-weekly bingo game which members
may work in lieu of paying $125 additional dues. Most if
not all the players are gentiles, none of whom appear to be
in a high-income bracket, and most of whom seem utterly
obsessed with the game to the exclusion of all else. The
first time I worked a bingo game, I leaned over to the
captain and whispered "This is the Poor Man's Atlantic
City!"
The importance of bingo to the shul can be glimpsed in this
unfortunate and totally true story:
Last year, it turned out that one of our bingo nights fell
on the first night of Shavuot. Even though several people
in a position to know were aware of the date, they opted to
run the game rather than risk alienating a large percentage
of the players who probably could care less that we're Jews,
but would only know they'd been deprived of their Wednesday
night entertainment. When this was brought to the rabbi's
attention (well after the fact), he got the people in charge
of bingo to make sure that where a yom tov/bingo conflict
exists, yom tov wins, and that the nights are switched with
another group using the rented hall (we use the Boy's Club
rather than our own premises).
The point of this story is that such thinking and behavior
typify, I fear, the badly distorted priorities of many
congregations.
The moral problems in supporting someone's possible gambling
"habit" aside (and I am quite aware that they represent a
rather large "aside"), what is increasingly difficult for me
personally (and for some other people in the shul) is the
extent to which bingo has become the synagogue's obsession,
not merely the players'; and the extent to which it reflects
the congregation's attitude toward--perhaps even fixation
on--money as an end unto itself, as well as in terms of the
priorities which govern how it is handled and how it is
spent.
For instance, we have an officer who once took the rabbi to
task over his intention to purchase a few sets of tefillin
for use by the Heh class pre-Bar Mitzvah boys. He objected
to spending $60 a pair. Anyone who knows tefillin at all
knows that at $60 a set they are likely to be barely kosher
at best, and certainly no example of hiddur mitzvah!
(Imagine if the rabbi had bought "or echod". . . .)
Ours is not a wealthy congregation, but it is growing; the
dues are high, and for most of us, it is a struggle to pay
them. But we are presently engaged in trying to raise
$900,000 from our own membership for a twofold purpose:
sanctuary beautification and additional classroom and
meeting room space. The former is a "nice to have" which
has become an obsession among certain Board members; the
latter--the classrooms--is absolutely critical, but has had
to be defended every inch of the way (the fight is not
nearly over). Appearance takes precedence over education;
no problem is seen in dealing with overcrowding in our
afternoon school by reducing the number of days from three
to two; no contradiction is glimpsed in the fact that we are
willing to substitute cosmetics for education, and may in
fact be creating a "beautiful" sanctuary in which far too
many of our children will never worship because we never
taught them how.
Admittedly, bingo itself occasionally goes too far; but
bingo is not the issue, merely a symptom of a mental and
spiritual attitude in which the "bottom line" substitutes
for a correct focus on the primary purposes of any synagogue
of whatever "denomination": religion and religious
education. We need the game because we need the money; but
the tragedy that is overtaking us is that we are printing
our religious and educational lives on dollar bills.