Home

After 40 years, it was time for a makeover at Congregation Beth-El in Edison.

Actually, Beth-El got new landscaping for the front of its building about seven years ago, and the lobby was remodeled in 1996, but the main sanctuary hadn't been significantly upgraded in four decades. Over the last few months, the sanctuary has been enlivened with new ceiling tile, lights, and sprawling blue curtains.

"It makes everyone just feel proud," Aaron Mansbach, Beth-El's president, said. "Everyone is happy to come into the building because it's nice, it's clean, it's bright."

As part of its renovation project, Beth-El also redid two bathrooms and added two new classrooms, with one of the classrooms in the back of the sanctuary. Now that the old, stained ceiling tile is gone from the sanctuary, the venue can be a more attractive venue for events and parties, Mansbach said.

Future renovations will include remodeling Beth-El's other two bathrooms and its kitchen, Mansbach said. Last Friday night, the synagogue's Triple Chai Club, a group of members age 54 and up, was very impressed with the upgrades when they sponsored an oneg, Mansbach said.

Beth-El raised money for the project through member donations and High Holiday appeals, Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg said.

"Basically we are the little shul that keeps going," Rosenberg said of Beth-El, which has 100 member families.

Rosenberg recently completed the "Handbook for the Jewish Mourner," a 31-page guide for dealing with grief and loss from both a halakhic and emotional perspective. After coming out with "A Guide for the Jewish Mourner" in 1995, Rosenberg made significant revisions and added new material to a booklet he said is simpler for a broad audience to comprehend than your average books on the Jewish laws of mourning.

"The reason I put it together is that most of the books dealing with mourning are so complicated and so extensive that the average person gets lost," Rosenberg said.

Besides for sections reviewing Jewish laws on preparation of the deceased, funerals, the shiva period, and Kaddish, Rosenberg's guide deals with how to help someone in sorrow and includes an eight-page section of comforting poems. In a page called "Don't Wait Too Long To Appreciate Your Parents," Rosenberg simulates 12 sequences in the lives of children based on their attitudes about their parents, from age 3 to 45.

Rosenberg lost his father in 1984 and his mother in 1994, a year before coming out with his first book on Jewish mourning. As the leader of Beth-El for over 20 years, he said that, "in working with bereaved people, I can draw upon my own experience." Unless you've lost a loved one, Rosenberg said, you can't really feel someone else's pain.

Those interested in obtaining a copy of "Handbook for the Jewish Mourner" should call Beth-El at (732) 985-7272.