Solidarity Shabbat Service Follows Friendship Circle

Westborough Connects Joins Together in a Circle of Friendship

The Westborough community and friends SHOWED UP to Congregation B’nai Shalom – to demonstrate unity, kindness and acceptance
The pouring hard rain this past Friday night did nothing to deter hundreds of Westborough residents and friends from coming out to show support for our neighbors of the Jewish faith.
We walked together from Hastings Elementary parking lot and entered the temple to greet people arriving for a Shabbat service at Congregation B’nai Shalom.

We handed out hundreds of letters and cards written by members of our Westborough community and surrounding towns, and we welcomed them – our friends, neighbors and people we don’t know but whom we see at community events, on the sports fields, in the coffee shops, restaurants and stores, in our schools, at the library and other places around town.
We were all together and it was powerful. The Solidarity Shabbat service was beautiful. With a full house, we listened to lovely music and Rabbi Rachel Gurevitz led a wonderful service, honoring the 11 Jewish worshipers who were killed in Pittsburgh and the other recent victims of mass shootings in Kentucky, Florida and California.

We listened to comforting remarks by WPS Superintendent Amber Bock, Police Chief Jeff Lourie, Selectman Shelby Marshall and Westborough Connects. We also heard Leigh Emery, chairperson of the Board of Selectman, recite the very beautiful Wendell Berry poem, “The Peace of Wild Things.”

The overall theme for the evening was the importance of kindness and connection to bring a brighter future for our world. We left with hope that events like this would bring us closer together and ensure that we are all committed to a kind, connected and supportive community where hate speech and hate crimes will never be tolerated.
Thank you Superintendent Amber Bock for this beautiful idea.

Thank you Rabbi Rachel Gurevitz, for embracing this and inviting the entire community into your temple and to the Shabbat service. We thank our state representatives Hannah Kane and Carolyn Dykema and State Senator Jamie Eldridge for coming to show their support. And we thank YOU – all the people and organizations who supported this, helped spread the word, wrote letters or cards, and came to the Circle of Friendship.

Please click here to view the Circle of Friendship ceremony and the full Solidarity Shabbat service.