The winter weather hasn’t been too bad up to the time of writing, when the snow is whirling around! –However nothing to stop any of our events going ahead and it has been quite a full winter. The important January event which was Holocaust Memorial Day was well supported in Norwich at St Peter Mancroft Church. The service was led by Rabbi Roddy Young and Vicar Fiona Haworth, with Jane Prinsley and Chloe France speaking about the medieval history which they had researched for their play and also moving contributions from others. Following the service an exhibition on loan from the Austrian Cultural Forum entitled Fur das Kind (for the child) was opened at the Forum, displaying a series of poignant photographs of the contents of the suitcases of the kindertransport children. The sparse contents of these cases brought home the children’s situation and sadly this can almost be likened to today’s situation with so many other refugees arriving in the UK. Rev. Daniel spoke eloquently at Lowestoft’s event at Lowestoft Station through which many kindertransport children arrived in 1939. Peter Prinsley also gave a well-received talk at an event at Wells Maltings, on the Medieval history of Norwich and the DNA evidence of the medieval bones found in Norwich.
We were pleased to welcome the Lord Lieutenant of Norwich, Lady Dannatt, the Mayor of Kings Lynn and other visitors to our service on Shabbat 21st January which was linked with the theme of Mental Health Week and Daniel’s sermon on this topic was very well received and the guests were very appreciative to have been invited to take part in the service.
The egalitarian Kehillat Meir services have been attended by a mix of some of NHC members, some of the NLJC and other interested people and have been well received. The services on the other three weeks of the month continue as usual with members and visitors attending but more regular or occasional visits from members would be welcomed.
We also hosted a well-attended meeting of the East Anglian Friends of Israel group at the Synagogue when Raffi Berg gave an amazing account of the smuggling of Ethiopian Jews out of Sudan. Everyone was spellbound and he made many autographed sales of his book ‘The Red Sea Spies’ afterwards.