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Worship

Share the joy of Shabbat and warmth of Jewish community with us every Friday evening. Explore your spirituality as we pray, learn, and connect.  

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Participate

What interests you? Religious School, Adult Education, Social Action, Leadership, Library, Giving, Volunteering, Outreach, Youth Groups, Camp.

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Calendar

We offer something for everyone! Check our calendar for worship, classes, events, special programs, and more.

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Member Spotlight

Our Temple family includes members with a variety of interests and experiences. Meet a few of them.

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Celebrate the High Holy Days at Achduth Vesholom!

L’shana Tovah! Please join us at Congregation Achduth Vesholom for an exciting and meaningful High Holy Days season as we welcome a new rabbi, guest cantors, and celebrate for the first time with two worship traditions!

The New Year 5780 will start with an expanded service schedule that includes Reform and traditional options on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Selichot, Tashlich, Sukkot, and Simchat Torah will be celebrated jointly. Visit our calendar for complete details.

Reform services will be led by Rabbi Paula Jayne Winnig, Achduth Vesholom’s new spiritual leader for the coming year. She will be joined by Cantor Yvon F. Shore, Director of Liturgical Arts and Music at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati, with accompaniment by Maestro Robert Nance. The Temple’s Hazemir Choir will sing at evening services and Yizkor.

Traditional worship will be led by Cantor Michael C. Small, our guest spiritual leader from Chicago. An attorney, Cantor Small is an active member and shaliach tzibur at North Suburban Synagogue Beth El in Highland Park, IL.

Erev Rosh Hashanah begins on Sunday evening, September 29.

Welcome to Congregation Achduth Vesholom

We welcome you to Congregation Achduth Vesholom, where we’ve been building Jewish community since 1848. As Indiana’s oldest Jewish congregation, we have a long tradition of bringing together those who want to share the joy of Judaism. 

Under the spiritual leadership of Rabbi Paula Jayne Winnig, we offer many opportunities for worship, learning, social action, culture, and friendship. A charter member of the Union for Reform Judaism, our congregation is warmly open to the traditional riches of the Jewish past, while continuously looking for ways to build a creative and meaningful future.

Our name means "unity and peace." We are truly a family at the Temple. We support one another in times of difficulty, share life’s blessings at times of joy, and work together to bring about tikkun olam, the betterment of the world around us.

Please visit our congregation and our beautiful Rifkin Campus at 5200. Find out how to become a member of our Temple family. Learn about our Religious School.

Visit Our Madge Rothschild Resource Center!
We welcome visitors to the Madge Rothschild Resource Center, home of the Rabbi Richard B. Safran Library and the Goldman Memorial Museum (currently under development). Our Rifkin Campus at 5200 Old Mill Road is home to Congregation Achduth Vesholom, the Madge Rothschild Resource Center, the Jewish Federation of Fort Wayne, PFW's Institute for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, the Fort Wayne Jewish Cemetery Association, and Brightpoint Head Start. Find out more.
Sign Up To Play Mah Jongg in the Madge Rothschild Resource Center!
We're scheduling drop-in games in the Madge Rothschild Resource Center. Please sign up to join us! 

If you'd like to receive periodic emails about  mah jongg play, please contact the Temple office at office@templecav.org or (260) 744-4245. Find out more about Mah Jongg resources in the Resource Center collection.
Temple Happenings
Find our latest newsletter. For more information about events, check the Temple calendar. Sign up for mah jongg.

Share the joy of Shabbat with us! Our Sabbath evening service on Fridays begins most weeks at 7:30 p.m. at the Temple. Our lay-led Shabbat morning service begins on Saturdays at 9:15 a.m. Find the calendar for special services and times.

We will observe Selichot and change the Torah covers to white to start of the High Holy Days season on Saturday, September 21 at 8 p.m. at the Temple.

Join us for Friday Night Live on September 20 at 7 p.m. when we celebrate Shabbat combining klezmer, folk, Middle Eastern and Hebrew melodies that everyone can sing.

Celebrate the High Holy Days with us! Rosh Hashanah begins on Sunday evening, September 29. All are welcome for our Reform or traditional services at 8 p.m., followed by our annual New Year's Reception. Find the full holiday schedule.

Yom Kippur services begin on Tuesday evening, October 8 and continue on Wednesday, October 9. Please join us for Break-the-Fast by making a reservation by October 2.

Memorial services will be held Sunday, October 6 at 1 p.m. at Lindenwood Cemetery and 2:30 p.m. at Fort Wayne Jewish Cemetery. Following the service at Fort Wayne Jewish Cemetery, we'll bury items from our genizah, a temporary area to store worn Hebrew holy books or other Jewish items that are deemed sacred and that require burial according to Jewish tradition. 

The Jewish community's Thoughtful Thursdays social action program continues its 10th year on October 2 providing twice-monthly bags of food and household items for the 72 students who attend Brightpoint Head Start at the Temple. Please support our 9th annual Apple Project fundraiser with your donation by October 2.

Religious School is underway for children who turn 4 by September 1 through high school. Parents must be members of the congregation to enroll children in classes. For membership information, please contact the Temple office at (260) 744-4245. 
Looking for some good books? The Rabbi Richard B. Safran Library is open whenever the Temple is open.

Our Temple Book Club for the year begins on Tuesday, September 24 when we discuss The Garden of Letters and e-visit with author Alyson Richman.

Join us for S'mores in the Sukkah and help decorate on Sunday, October 13. Please RSVP by October 4. 

Save the date for the Temple's 18th annual Corned Beef on Rye - Sure to Satisfy Fundraiser on Thursday, November 7!

In the community:

The Northeast Indiana Jewish Genealogy Society is hosting an exciting Jewish Family Day on Sunday, September 22 from noon to 3 p.m. at the Rifkin Campus. Learn about the Fort Wayne Jewish Families Project.

Temple member Irv Adler will present "Families Lost and Found: Tracing My Viennese Roots After The Holocaust" during the George R. Mather lecture on Sunday, October 6 at 2 p.m. at The History Center, 302 E. Berry St. The program is part of Violins of Hope.

Violins of Hope is coming in November to Fort Wayne. Save the date for our Violins of Hope Shabbat service on Friday, November 15.
The Jewish community's Thoughtful Thursdays bag assembly team will meet on Wednesday, January 10 to put together bags of food items for the 66 students who attend Brightpoint Head Start at the Temple.
Violins of Hope Coming in November
On November 9-24, the Jewish Federation of Fort Wayne and the Fort Wayne Philharmonic will host Violins of Hope, a community-wide collaboration of music, visual art, theater, public conversation, interfaith dialogue, reading, and educational presentations designed to commemorate the DEFIANCE, RESILIENCE, AND LEGACY of those who were affected or silenced by Nazi Germany. Find out more.