Suburban Temple-Kol Ami is a mid-size Reform congregation that embodies the tenets of Reform Judaism:
- pride in our Jewish heritage,
-
individual autonomy,
-
allegiance to the Jewish people,
-
and observance of traditions in an atmosphere that is
open to creativity
and innovation.
Founded in 1948, Suburban Temple-Kol Ami serves approximately 500 families who reflect a broad spectrum of the Cleveland Jewish community.
Here, each member’s interpretation of Judaism is respected and supported. As Jews all over the world seek to ensure the perpetuation of Judaism into the future, we encourage this continuity by creating an environment where each of us can develop and define our own relationship with God, Judaism, and our synagogue. Similarly, the Religious School seeks to work together with parents to enhance our students’ understanding of their Jewish heritage and nurture pride in their emerging Jewish identity.
Suburban Temple-Kol Ami is proud to have served as a place of joy, comfort, community, and family for our members over the past 50 years. The temple continues to be dynamic and responsive as it seeks to meet the ever-changing needs of its members.
We invite you to visit with our congregation; feel free to meet with Rabbi Eric Bram, Executive Director Loree Resnik, or Religious School Director Debbie Bram. Participate in any of our worship services or family celebrations to get a sense of our joyous and friendly community. This truly is a place that is large enough to meet your needs, but small enough to know your name.
About the Temple - Our Building, Our Home
Our beautiful building, built in 1954, is located in a nine-acre, park-like setting on convenient Chagrin Boulevard in Beachwood. Our location always has been convenient to all of Cleveland’s eastern suburbs, and freeway extensions now allow our congregants to be within an easy drive from downtown Cleveland, west-side suburbs, and Geauga, Summit, and Portage counties
Expansive glass allows us to view our beautiful surroundings and leads us from our sun-filled lobby to our sacred space, the Sanctuary.
Visitors immediately feel welcomed by the warm brick walls of this meditative setting, and a soaring copper clad ark inspires reverence. The Sanctuary, which seats 250 people, can flexibly accommodate many different sizes of groups. A partition can segment the Sanctuary for smaller groups (100 congregants and fewer). This is how we worship on Friday nights, and we celebrate our students becoming Bar or Bat Mitzvah on Saturdays. But on the High Holydays, we can open our walls and expand to up to 900 seats.
Dedicated to the concept of a congregation that is one with its Rabbi, the bima is only slightly higher than the congregational seats, making prayer a truly special experience here at Suburban Temple-Kol Ami. Our Temple’s foyer, where we come together for an Oneg Shabbat following each late Friday service, features a magnificent stained glass wall depicting the movement of the Jewish people throughout history.
The Silverman Garden Room
We are indeed fortunate to have this special space in our temple. A beautifully paneled room, with a glass wall overlooking a courtyard, warm wood floors, and a copper-clad fireplace, the Garden Room is our home for smaller Sabbath dinners, adult education programs, brunches, luncheons, and smaller private functions of our members, their families, and friends. It has housed receptions for baby-namings, Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, anniversary parties, and milestone birthday events. Like a large living room, the Garden Room is warm and intimate with soft, comfortable upholstered furniture that can be removed for table seating.
Our sliding doors open to a lovely courtyard. As a Temple family, we decorate our congregation’s sukkah there. Our congregants’ families often extend their use of the Garden Room into the courtyard on balmy spring, summer, or fall afternoons.
Arrangements may be made with our Executive Director Loree Resnik for the use of this room. A list of approved caterers allows you to plan functions in all price ranges.
The Mandel-Gries Social Hall
Our synagogue is a place where so many things happen. Together, we celebrate in the Mandel-Gries Social Hall. A lovely carpeted room with beautiful chandeliers and a glass wall allowing us to view the lawn and trees that make up our property, it is a place to dine, a place to dance, a place to come together both as a temple family and at a private simcha for friends and family of congregants.
This versatile room meets all of the needs of our members: from temple Sabbath dinners, to Chanukah celebrations, to Purim carnivals, to receptions for Bar and Bat Mitzvah celebrants, to the most elegant weddings. A list of approved caterers is varied in price and in style and offers congregants choices to make their event reflect their personal ideas. Our Executive Director Loree Resnik works with our families as they plan for the special times of their lives celebrated at Suburban Temple-Kol Ami.
The Gries Library
Our recently renovated Gries Library was named for Rabbi Moses J. Gries, the first Reform Rabbi in Cleveland. The Gries family has donated much of Rabbi Gries’ rare book collection to our library, which recently achieved certification. It has an outstanding collection, particularly for a library of its size. Our library welcomes all of our congregants from our very youngest to our senior adults. Researchers of all ages are welcome to use the Gries Library.
The Oppenheimer Family Education Center
The Oppenheimer Family Education Center was completed in the fall of 2001. Adult family members are always encouraged to participate in the religious education of Suburban Temple’s youths, and this cozy but functional addition allows the temple to offer a variety of small-group, age-specific, or intergenerational programs and activities on Sundays. The new wing will house a myriad of educational programs and preschool programs and provide a space where adults and children can come together to learn, create, sing, or exchange ideas and stories.
Modeled after the Silverman Garden Room, the new addition also features a courtyard with natural stone seating. Young people can gather in the Risman Courtyard for outdoor worship services, sing-alongs, or group discussions.
Lakeview Cemetery – Daffodil Hill
Since the founding of Suburban Temple in the 1940s, members have had burial privileges in our beautiful Daffodil Hill section of Lakeview Cemetery. It is located off Mayfield Road, near the Murray Hill section of Cleveland that houses many art galleries and fine restaurants. Lakeview is a truly historic cemetery in Cleveland. Operated by a cemetery foundation, it is a very large, beautifully maintained property and the final resting place of the 20th President of the United States, James A. Garfield. Members may purchase cemetery lots directly through Lakeview for themselves and their families. More information regarding Lakeview and its use may be obtained by calling Executive Director Loree Resnik at the temple office.
How you choose to express your Judaism is a decision of major significance. Though Judaism is one history and one people, its practice conforms to many varied interpretations. Here at Suburban Temple-Kol Ami, we are guided by these precepts:
- That each generation of Jews adapts
our past to our
modern world, yet retains loving ties to our ancient
and rich heritage;
- That traditions have an important role in modern life, yet
the observance and nature of specific practices is
a
matter of personal choice;
- That because of the above two precepts, we remain
flexible and innovative within the context of Reform
Judaism.
We invite you to experience our congregational life and decide if Suburban Temple-Kol Ami reflects your view of what it means to be a Jew.
The Suburban Temple began in 1945 as a small study group looking for an innovative approach to their families’ religious needs. Members of Cleveland’s Reform congregations wanted and needed a new expression of their Judaism, and the founding members of Suburban Temple envisioned a congregation small enough to:
- allow each member the opportunity
to participate in
congregational activities,
- enable one Rabbi to fully meet the needs of all members
from childhood through maturity,
- allow members full involvement in Religious School
affairs.
In 1948, Suburban Temple was incorporated as a new congregation and became a member of the Reform Union of American Hebrew Congregations. Rabbi Myron Silverman was spiritual leader, guiding the congregation as it grew in membership and stature. Development of the current temple in Beachwood, Ohio, began when the cornerstone was laid in 1954, and the congregation continued to thrive in its vital role in Cleveland’s Reform Jewish Community. By 1964, a new wing was added to house the temple’s many activities.
In 1976, Rabbi Michael Oppenheimer assumed the pulpit as the temple’s new spiritual leader. Founding Rabbi Silverman became Rabbi Emeritus until his death in 1981. Rabbi Oppenheimer retired in 2002 assuming the title of Rabbi Emeritus after 26 years of dedicated service to our congregation.
Rabbi Eric Bram became our spiritual leader in July, 2002. Rabbi Bram came to us after having served as Senior Rabbi at Indianapois Hebrew Congregation and has brought new and exciting educational, cultural and spiritual programs to us. Already, he is an active and vibrant member of Cleveland’s Jewish community, participating in many city-wide programs.
Anticipating the challenges of a new decade, the temple’s leadership began a major interior renovation in the Sanctuary and Social Hall in the late ‘80s.
Today, Suburban Temple-Kol Ami is a strong, vital institution with a far greater impact on the community than its numbers would indicate. With more than 500 families, primarily from Cleveland’s eastern suburbs, the congregation reflects a broad spectrum of Cleveland’s Jewish Community. Representing major businesses and professional leadership, many members play important roles in the supporting agencies of the Jewish Community Federation. Many also are engaged in civic and philanthropic leadership roles on community-wide, national, and international levels.
We at Suburban Temple-Kol Ami think joining a synagogue is a little bit like getting married. First, you really need to go on a few dates! We invite you to share our worship services, come to a program, meet with Rabbi Eric Bram or Executive Director Loree Resnik, and learn about our philosophy, our activities, our Religious School, and all that we offer here at Suburban.
There are many ways to get started. We welcome your phone calls at (216) 991-0700. Just ask to speak to Loree Resnik, who will answer your questions and point you to other resources for finding out about Suburban Temple-Kol Ami: a visit to the temple, a membership brochure, some Temple Bulletins, or a membership application. She will also talk to you about the finances involved in Temple membership.
You can also reach us by email at lresnik@suburbantemple.org. Or fax us at (216) 991-0705. Our membership committee looks forward to an opportunity to call you and help you get to know the congregation they proudly share.
We believe Cleveland is a truly wonderful city in which to live and live Jewishly. There are so many agencies, institutions, and synagogues here that there truly are many niches for everyone. Choice is a benefit of Cleveland, but it also makes it a little harder to find out where you ought to be. We hope we can help you make that right fit and, if we are it, we will warmly welcome you into our congregational family.
"Without sustenance there can be no Torah."
The unique charitable spirit that has always characterized our temple is particularly evident in the area of financial contributions. In a mid-size congregation whose philosophy dictates the highest level of services, financial demands on members could be great. Suburban Temple-Kol Ami has, however, always attempted to balance these economic needs with the life situations of member families. This sensitivity continues to exemplify the membership’s character.
Almost 20 percent of the members voluntarily contribute more than the regular dues. This enables the congregation to offer financial alternatives for those families experiencing economic hardship. We are committed to the maintenance of Endowment Funds that generate income over and above the monies generated by dues. Since the earliest days of Suburban Temple, new members have been expected to pledge a sum to the Fund for the future, payable over a five-year period. These monies are used for purchase of equipment and for major replacement and repairs to the temple property.
Individual financial concerns may always be discussed in the strictest confidence with our Executive Director Loree Resnik.
Suburban Temple’s Women’s Committee is a group that’s dedicated to service and community. It continues this strong tradition of service to the congregation by providing holiday programming, special dinners, and many Religious School programs for our students.
Look forward to upcoming programs or suggest special events yourself.
The women of our congregation are busy and will keep you busy, too. Contact
Sue Hoffman for more information.
WOMEN'S
COMMITTEE CALENDAR 2008-09
Updated calendar will be posted soon for this year's events
Vintage Suburban is the wonderful social group created for our congregants who are 60+ in age and looking for exciting events and a chance to build fellowship and community with others in the congregation.
Vintage Suburban started in 1994 with eight couples interested in social communication and now has more than 200 family units as its members. The group’s most popular events are Sunday bagel brunches with speakers—usually members of the congregation—who present a variety of topics from Jewish genealogy to politics. Also popular are group trips, like a trip to see theater in Toronto.
Try a bus tour, special dinners, speakers, or music and theater outings. Upcoming events include a Niagara-on-the-Lake weekend and the annual Chanukah dinner.
Camaraderie develops during planning of the events as well. If you’d like to be a member of the group’s steering committee, you can help plan events. For more information, contact the temple office at (216) 991-0700.
Come Find Us
Easy to find and accessible from Cleveland freeways, Suburban Temple-Kol Ami is located in Beachwood. We’re on Chagrin Boulevard about a block west of the intersection of Chagrin and Green Road. For help in finding us, click on Maps and Directions.
Whether you’re interested in becoming a member, or you’re a current member with questions, we’d love to hear from you. Feel free to call, send us an email, or drop by for a visit.
Suburban Temple-Kol Ami
22401 Chagrin Boulevard
Beachwood, OH 44122
Phone: (216) 991-0700
Fax: (216) 991-0705
Executive Director: Loree
Resnik
Email: lresnik@suburbantemple.org