Guess what’s the main topic at board meetings. If you said, "Financial matters," you’d be right.

Now, guess what’s second?

It’s trying to increase synagogue attendance – for daily minyan, holidays, and Shabbat.

We try a lot of "gimmicks" but I recently read a two-page essay by George Goodman ("On Going to Synagogue – A Personal Testimony," Commentary, May 2009) that sums up how I feel.

Here are some excerpts for thought.

" . . . I did not attend synagogue for almost 40 years . . . Then, it occurred to me . . . I was missing something. . .

I attend services because, whether or not I believe in God, I believe in Judaism . . . with absolute and unshakable conviction and in the importance of bearing witness to this religion, to its rituals and to the people who kept faith with it . . .

"I attend to observe how my own response to the services has matured . . The services cannot and should not change to suit my individual needs . . . I attend because I was the one who changed, not the synagogue. I learned to want and try to be a better Jew . . .

Outside the shul, I take joy in my scientific inclinations . . . But a man like me needs frequent reminding . . . there is more to the world than empirical evidence and rational argument . . .

I attend services because Jews can be irritating, infuriating, and insufferable. And so can I . . . I attend services because I need to be with other Jews."

When I enter the sanctuary, I see the names of the dead on the plaques . . . I never knew these people (but) these names demand to be looked at, hallowed, and remembered . . . I want someone to attend services long after me and see my name . . . If we will not do this for our predecessors, will our successors do it for us?

My week is chaos . . . Attending services offers me a fixed point of reference . . . I am ashamed it took me so long to learn . . . that this small space, part private, part public, where one takes momentary refuge truly is a sanctuary . . .

After a lifetime of squandering opportunities and showing up late for the party, of seeing the joke only after others have stopped laughing, of simply not getting the point, I refuse to make the same mistake with respect to Judaism. It is an endless feast. It asks of us only to sit at the table . . .

At shul, I see the children . . . How can we insist that they must learn . . . if we show them at the same time these things have no value for us? I attend because I want the children to see me as an adult attending services. And I want them one day to want their children to see them attending services in turn.

I attend because if I don’t, who will?"