Join the Sanctuary + Immigrant Justice Committee.

Shir Tikvah's response to the anti-immigrant rhetoric and policies of our federal government was to become a Sanctuary Congregation in 2017.  Since then we've hosted a mixed-status family of seven, and helped build an inter-faith coalition with other like-minded South Minneapolis congregations.  Now we're working to change immigration policy at the county and state level.  (For a complete history, see below.)

We meet the third Monday of each month at 5 PM (on Zoom until further notice).  We monitor our Sanctuary family's progress, engage in education and advocacy to change policies that affect our immigrant neighbors, and consider new projects.  

Interested in joining us? Contact: Dara Rudick here 

Help change immigration policy.

• Through Jewish Community Action (JCA), Shir Tikvah members are engaged in a campaign to press Hennepin and Ramsey County Commissioners to adopt “separation” ordinances prohibiting county cooperation with federal immigration authorities. Ready for some policy advocacy with elected officials?

Interested in joining us? Contact: Dennis Guillaume here 

• As part of the Sanctuary State Coalition, we support drivers licenses for all regardless of immigration status, an end to state and local government collaboration with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and an end to private prisons.

Help a refugee family.   

• Build a “welcome kit” for arriving refugee families, to be distributed by the State Health Department, here.

• Lutheran Social Services of MN, refugee resettlement (at refugeeservices@lssmn.org )

Volunteer your time or expertise.

Here are some local organizations looking for volunteers: 

• The Advocates for Human Rights

• Immigrant Court Observation (a project of the Binger Center for New Americans)

• Immigrant Law Center of MN

• ICOM

Two ways to donate.  

• Help support our Sanctuary family. While the parents await work permits and secure employment, they depend on a community fund to meet all their essential needs. Every dollar raised directly supports the family, and is not tax-deductible. Checks should be made out to “Once Strangers, Inc” and mailed to Andrea Rubenstein, 51008 Bryant Ave. S., Minneapolis, MN 55419. You may also give electronically via GoFundMe here.

• Your tax-deductible contribution to the Shir Tikvah Sanctuary Fund helps us cover the cost of printing, postage, video rental, etc. Learn more about giving here.

Why Sanctuary?  Why us?

The idea of movement — of leaving one place in search of another — is the story of our people: Abraham and Sarah leave their land, crossing borders and boundaries, without documentation; the Israelites flee Pharaoh’s bondage in Egypt, and seek a new home and a new life in the Promised Land; Spanish Jews fled their homes in Spain during the Inquisition; Eastern European Jews fled the Pale of Settlement when they were attacked by Cossacks; Jews fled Europe before, during, and after the Shoah; Middle Eastern and North African Jews left for Israel in the 1950s and 60s.

You know the heart of the immigrant, the Torah reminds us, because you were strangers in the land of Egypt.  Abraham and Sarah open their tent flaps wide to welcome strangers from all directions, setting the moral table for radical hospitality for all the generations that would flow from them.  We take seriously God’s commandment to show compassion to our neighbors, to welcome them into our homes.

Although our stories differ across time and space, the underlying religious commitment remains the same: all people — especially the vulnerable — are to be treated with compassion, decency, and righteously.  It is our religious duty to walk with those fleeing violence and slavery and war who seek to build lives here or have lived here for years.  Our theological commitment is to dream a new world into being.

On January 20, 2017, Shir Tikvah declared ourselves a Sanctuary Congregation to stand with those human beings who may lack documentation but whose humanity we witness and celebrate.  We declared our willingness to offer safety, refuge and welcome in our building to immigrants regardless of immigration status.  We joined more than 70 Sanctuary synagogues across the nation as we put our beliefs into action..

As of February 2022, we are one of 56 Sanctuary and Sanctuary-supporting congregations in Minnesota, and an active member of the South Minneapolis Immigrant Justice Coalition.  Our work built bridges across age, religion, race and immigration status.  For over three years the Coalition provided material, financial, and volunteer support as Shir Tikvah housed a family in danger of deportation by ICE.  Thankfully, their story has a “happily so far” ending:  They relocated last August to a rental house in a Metro suburb, the kids are thriving in school, and the parents patiently wait while their applications for work permits are processed.  They are on their way, but still depend on us for financial support; a GoFundMe campaign raised enough money to pay for rent, utilities, and food for a year.

For details about the family's story, see the TCJewfolk article here.