When Isaac Belfer moved to Washington, D.C., a decade ago, he sought an LGBTQ+ Jewish community, and Bet Mishpachah was the “perfect fit.”
“What drew me to this congregation was its 50 years of history,” said Nino McQuown, Bet Mishpachah’s communications and development coordinator.
Whatever the reason they decided to join, members all speak to Bet Mishpachah’s welcoming atmosphere. The egalitarian synagogue that served as a refuge for LGBTQ+ Jews recently celebrated a major milestone: its half-century anniversary.
The Bet Mishpachah community gathered for a gala on Oct. 25 in D.C., which recognized Rabbi Emeritus Bob Saks and attorney Evan Wolfson, the founder of the campaign Freedom to Marry.
“So many people from Bet Mishpachah’s history are part of it,” McQuown said of the gala.
“We are highlighting the work of our founders 50 years ago and those who are still with us — celebrating them but also reflecting on what was and how we have built the congregation into what it is now,” Rabbi Jake Singer-Beilin said.
The community will also honor Saks, the first rabbi hired by Bet Mishpachah, who assumed his role during the AIDS crisis.
“[People] realized that the pastoral needs of the community were going to outweigh the abilities of their lay leaders,” Singer-Beilin said. “In this really intense time in our country and community, they hired this wonderful rabbi who’s still a part of our community and is beloved.”
McQuown worked with fellow member Don Jewler to assemble a book of oral histories from members over the years. “It’s really cool to see people’s stories about being part of [Bet Mishpachah], what the mission meant to them,” McQuown said. “That’s one of the things that I really love about this congregation — how centered joy is in everything we do.”
“We’re seeing [the gala] as a moment to be together and to celebrate that we’re still here and that we have this family that we’ve created,” Singer-Beilin said. “We want to celebrate. We want to rejoice and we want to laugh despite everything that’s going on in our country around us, in the LGBTQ space and beyond.”
The synagogue community was founded in 1975 out of a need for an inclusive space. Members met in living rooms and small venues before Bet Mishpachah was housed in the Edlavitch DC Jewish Community Center.
“People wanted a space where they could fully be themselves in a Jewish space, and they weren’t finding that in their synagogue communities,” Singer-Beilin said. “They found that they had to hide their identity because being gay was not something that was really accepted, even in progressive Jewish spaces in 1975. They wanted a place where they could bring together their Jewishness and their gayness.”
“What [Bet Mishpachah] provided for 50 years now is a home to people who might not necessarily fit in other places,” said Belfer, a member and the chair of Bet Mishpachah’s social action committee. “It provided a community, a safe haven, a place for them to express themselves and be their full LGBTQ and Jewish selves.”
After the community was founded, Bet Mishpachah became a “place to pray and eat together,” according to Singer-Beilin. Members went by their first names only, especially those who worked for the government or in similar jobs.
“It wasn’t safe for them to be identified as being part of this congregation,” Singer-Beilin said. “Even in this space where they could be more open and more themselves, there was still a risk of being identified as being part of this congregation. And luckily, that has changed in the years since.”
Pervasive homophobia prompted members of the LGBTQ+ community to want to gather. “What people were looking for was a place to come together with other gay Jews and to say that being engaged Jewishly was not at odds with who they loved,” Singer-Beilin said.
Belfer described the mainly lay-led D.C. synagogue as a “community of peers.” Many of the 190 members have been part of Bet Mishpachah for decades.
“It’s really important to look back and remember where we came from and just how different it was 50 years ago for members of the LGBTQ+ community in Jewish spaces, in the federal government, just out there in the world, and to celebrate our wins,” Singer-Beilin said, citing marriage equality, workplace protections and family rights.
“We’re able to look back and say, ‘We, as a congregation, have helped make some of these changes through our social justice work and our willingness to be out there and be known,’” he added.
Community gatherings reflected joy and meaningful relationships, according to McQuown.
“There was this deep need for community and support [during the AIDS epidemic], and as the congregation grew over those 50 years, the depth of the connections that I see between members in the synagogue is so profound,” McQuown said, adding that some members have even found lifelong partners through Bet Mishpachah.
In addition to reflecting upon the past, the community is also looking toward the next 50 years.
“Bet Mishpachah has been thinking about how to move forward into the future, and continue to really serve that purpose as a place of belonging and a place of connection and to support folks through the hard and necessary parts and also the joyful and special parts of living at the axis of [LGBTQ+ and Jewish] identities,” McQuown said.
