Denise's Bat Mitzvah

[goljerp]

Last Saturday was my oldest niece's Bat Mitzvah. (No, her name isn't Denise, that was a bad joke). She did a very good job, and everything was very nice... but boy. It has been a long time since I went to Reform services. Monica, is it normal to skip large chunks of the "Shabbat Service II" in the siddur? (I'm blanking on the name, but it's

Comments

[cellio]

Gates of Prayer (thicker blue book) was followed by Gates of Prayer (gender-neutralized, thinner gray book), which was followed by Mishkan T'filah which came out maybe five years ago. I'm not sure which of those you're referring to.

Reform skips a lot of parts of the traditional service, alas. Different congregations will include or skip different amounts, but one thing that frustrates me about the movement's siddurim is that they don't even give you the option for a lot of it! Like, Mishkan T'filah skips from Ashrei to Psalm 150; too bad if you wanted to do the others. They did put the rest of the b'rachot after the Sh'ma in, after leaving them out in GOP. But... yeah, it's different

[goljerp]

Yes, it was Mishkan T'filah. I think that a piano wouldn't bother me as much as an organ, as the pianist would normally be in the same room as the congregation, although I think guitar would definitely be my preference if I had to choose one of the three.