In Israel, Jewish life felt public, welcoming, and alive; in Montreal, it has felt guarded, costly, and closed.
There is a difference between being alone and being excluded, and as Pesach approaches, I am feeling that difference sharply.
What I miss is not only Jerusalem itself, although I miss Jerusalem deeply. What I miss is the religious life I had there, the way Shabbat and the holidays were lived not as private events for the lucky, the connected, or the well-off, but as part of the air itself. In Jerusalem, Jewish life was not hidden behind closed doors. It was everywhere. You felt it in the streets, in the greetings, in the quiet before Shabbat, in the singing from synagogue, in the fact that everyone around you seemed to be moving toward the same sacred time.
Shabbat in Jerusalem was the highlight of my week. I loved Kabbalat Shabbat services, the singing, the familiar prayers, the feeling that the city itself was changing. I loved going back for Shacharit in the morning, then standing around at kiddush, talking, listening, lingering, with nowhere more important to be. I loved the afternoons too, when people were out walking in the neighborhood, and the whole area seemed to move at a different pace. There was something deeply comforting about that rhythm. Even when I spent much of Shabbat on my own, I did not feel abandoned. I still felt part of Jewish life.
That is what I miss most. Not that I was constantly invited out. Not that I went to meals every week. I often did not. Sometimes it was enough to go to services Friday night and Shabbat morning, go to kiddush, stand around and talk, and know that if I wanted more, there were options. There was often seudah shlishit somewhere else. There were holiday meals. There were people who opened their homes. The point was not that I took every opportunity. The point was that the opportunities were there. The door was open.
My synagogue in Jerusalem, Shira Hadasha, did not know me when I first came, yet they welcomed me. I was a newcomer, an olah, someone without family there, and that did not seem to matter. Members volunteered to host Friday night meals or Shabbat lunches, and newcomers and olim could ask to join. Maybe you brought a bottle of wine as a thank you. That was it. It was simple, natural, and kind.
The same was true of Rabbi Poston’s warm and growing Yiboneh Center, where I went for seudah shlishit and holiday meals. I met him and his wife on my very first Shabbat in Israel, and over time I came to feel like family there. That is one of the things I loved most about religious life in Jerusalem. You could arrive alone and still find a place. Not because life in Israel is easy. It is not. Financially, Israel can be brutal. Landlords can make your life miserable. Bureaucracy can wear you down. But spiritually, in my experience, there was far more room. If you wanted to be part of Jewish life, there was a way in.
If this piece is a lament, it is also a thank you — to the Jerusalem communities that welcomed a newcomer and made Jewish life feel open, shared, and alive.
I used to go regularly to the Kotel for spirituality and prayer. That too was part of the rhythm of my life. The Kotel was there, always, part of the spiritual fabric of Jerusalem. And so were the greetings that make Jewish life feel shared: Shabbat Shalom before Shabbat, shavua tov after it ended, Chag Sameach before the holidays. In Israel, those greetings are not just polite words. They are the language of a society living Jewish time together.
Pesach in Jerusalem had that same feeling, maybe even more intensely. The whole city was moving toward it. You felt it in the stores, in the conversations, in the atmosphere. The holiday did not belong only to private homes or to those who could afford communal fees. It belonged to the city. It belonged to the people. Even if you were alone, you were not outside of it.
The loss is sharper because this year I cannot simply go back to Jerusalem for Pesach even if I want to. My own ticket on Air Canada was canceled, and Air Canada has suspended Tel Aviv service through May. El Al is far beyond what I can afford, and with Israel operating under severe wartime flight limits, there is often little or nothing realistically available to book. I am not only missing Jerusalem in the abstract. I am missing a place I cannot get back to for the holiday.
That is what feels so different in Montreal.
I know the diaspora is different. I know Jewish communities outside Israel live with security concerns, with antisemitic threats, with all kinds of pressures. I am not naïve about that. But there is also something else going on, something that has nothing to do with security and everything to do with the way diaspora communities too often function socially and spiritually. They are guarded. Closed. Exclusive. The physical guards at synagogue doors sometimes feel like a metaphor for the communal culture itself.
That is harsh, but it is how it feels.
In Jerusalem, I felt welcomed before I was known. In Montreal, I have felt far more acutely how often access to Jewish communal life is shaped by money, membership, and social structure in ways that can leave people outside. This week, that feeling became painfully concrete. I wanted to attend a communal Shabbat HaGadol meal before Pesach, but the fee for non-members was $130. This was not a symbolic fee but a meaningful cost. Other synagogues farther away in the city were charging less for similar events, underscoring that this was not a nominal amount. But this was never really about the food. I told my rabbi that too. I wanted community. I wanted to spend time in a joyous atmosphere on Shabbat, to feel part of something before Pesach, and not to be alone. That was the real loss.
Some people will still say that it was only a meal. But that is exactly the problem. A Shabbat gathering before Pesach is not just a meal. It is part of the communal and spiritual life of a Jewish community. When access to something like that is shaped too heavily by cost, people do not simply miss dinner. They miss connection, belonging, and the chance to participate in Jewish life at the moment they may need it most.
What hurt me was not simply staying home. In Jerusalem, I often stayed home from meals. But there is a world of difference between staying home because you choose to and staying home because the door is closed to you. That is the difference I am living right now.
And I feel it not only as loneliness but as spiritual dislocation. I have only been back from Israel for five weeks, and already I feel more detached from my Judaism here than I did there. That is not because Judaism means less to me in Montreal. It is because Jewish life feels less accessible here, less lived, less open, less generous.
Diaspora communities often worry about assimilation, about people drifting away, about weakening Jewish identity. Fair enough. But maybe we also have to ask what kind of communities we are offering people. If Jewish life feels transactional, socially closed, and dependent on money, access, and being known, then we should not be shocked when people feel alienated. If a person cannot find a place at a Shabbat table before Pesach because of cost or formality, then the problem is not only that person’s loneliness. The problem is with the community.
No, Montreal is not Jerusalem. The diaspora cannot recreate the public Jewish rhythm of Israel, where Shabbat and the holidays shape national life. But that is not an excuse for failing to build warmer, more inclusive communities. It is not an excuse for allowing money to determine who sits at the table. It is not an excuse for making Jewish life feel guarded rather than shared.
What I miss this Pesach is not only Jerusalem’s beauty. I miss the open-heartedness I found there. I miss the ease of being part of Jewish life without having to prove I belonged. I miss Kabbalat Shabbat services, the singing, Shacharit, kiddush, the afternoon walks, the Kotel, the greetings from strangers, the sense that Jewish time was something public and shared and alive. I miss the feeling that even if I was alone, I was not abandoned.
Israel was hard in many ways. But spiritually, it made room for me.
That is what I am mourning this Pesach.
Not only Jerusalem.
It’s an open door.
Bonnie K. Goodman, BA, MLIS, is a historian, journalist, librarian, educator, and artist. She holds a Diploma of Collegial Studies in Communications: Art, Media, and Theatre (specializing in Fine Arts and Jewish Studies) from Vanier College, a B.A. in History and Art History, and an MLIS from McGill University, with graduate study in Judaic Studies at Concordia University and Jewish Education at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem’s Melton Centre. She has recently pursued advanced training in drawing, painting, and sculpture at Bezalel Academy of Arts and was a 2025 participant in the Studio of Her Own professional development program for artists in Israel.
She contributed to the landmark reference work History of American Presidential Elections, 1789–2008 (2011), edited by Gil Troy, Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., and Fred L. Israel, and authored On This Day in History…: Significant Events in the American Year (2024). A former Features Editor at the History News Network, where she launched influential series such as Top Young Historians and History Doyens, Goodman has also worked as a political reporter at Examiner.com, covering U.S. politics, universities, religion, and culture.
Her academic and journalistic writing bridges historical scholarship and public engagement, focusing on American political history, Jewish identity, and the intersection of education and culture. Goodman writes and teaches on topics that explore the relationship between history, collective memory, and cultural expression. Her recent research and essays have appeared in The Jerusalem Report, The Times of Israel, and History News Network. Through both her historical writing and visual art, Goodman seeks to illuminate the continuities between the Jewish past and present and to highlight how memory and creativity shape national and spiritual identity.