The women of the Temple are the back bone of our congregation. They played a role in every single sector of the congregation. The Sisterhood is often compared to the most beautiful jewel in the crown of our synagogue, and they certainly deserve that accolade.
Sisterhood was started by wonderful women such as Thelma Gild, Freda Sacks, Vera Friede, Ann Davis Marks, Ann Lipshitz, Helga Ucko and Margaret Habeman.
Cecile Bass, chair of welfare for more than 25 years who was the backbone of the organization. She and her husband Benny, used to help organize the fetes at the City Hall. In those days we would sometimes make about R7 to R10 000 – a very large sum of money in the 1970’s.
We had three crèches that we worked with in the townships and we actually went out there regularly to take food stuff and toys, as well as blankets and the Xmas parties Later we started a crèche at Austerville and a program of art and drama , as well as a small library, which when they built the Austerville community Hall, became a part of the general library.
From their untiring work catering in the kitchen for brochas, Bnei mitzvoth, Chagim, the Pesach Seder , refreshments for the regular Oneg Shabbat that used to be held every last Friday of the month, seeing to the women’s arm of the Chevra Kadisha, ensuring the Friendship Club grew from strength to strength.
In the early days, the sewing circle met every Monday morning and created the most beautiful articles for sale, especially at our annual fetes- Tallit bags with gorgeous embroidery, hand-made tray cloths, hand knitted and crocheted baby goods and children’s clothes, all in demand at our regular fetes!. These were sometimes held at the City Hall and large suns of money were made to contribute to the major welfare work that Sisterhood undertook.
In 1977, we held out very first Interfaith program for Sisterhood’s “Operation Understanding” which was started by Paddy Meskin when she was president of SAUTS. We invited about do people from churches and mosques in the are to a Mock seder to explain what the relevance of the seder and Peasach. We hoped to get about 40-50people. 435 arrived. We had to move the function into the Temple to be able to seat them! It was a beautiful function with everyone reaching out to one another.
Our welfare committee was under the convenorship of Cecile Bass, who was in this position for some 25 years. Preschools were built and assisted . There were three township preschools back in the 60’s – Inkelisa, Thembelisha and the crèche at Lamontville.
Blankets to our pensioners in Chesterville, and food parcels for the old people of Chesterville and Lamontville – the list was long.
We created a library in Austerville and started art and drama classes for the children. Our library eventually became the City library for the community.
We have been working with Chidren’s Home and other Child Welfare organizations for over 30 years.
The ladies of Sisterhood today carry on that great tradition with the work that they are doing in Mavela Creche, the child headed households at Mavela, the Co-op, Sivelile Creche and the new project at Sisebenzile High School. The project in Mavela is now 14 years old, and has developed into the core of the community. We helped them build two crèches, a hall for the youth and community, a hospice and care centre which has 21 beds, and is run entirely by volunteers from the community. The are there 24 //7 – 365 days of the year. The patients are mainly older people who have no-one to care for them. They are all 70 to 90 years old, in many cases they are bedridden and need care for everything. The angels of Mavela are there.
Three years ago we built a laboratory for the High School, as well as four classrooms, a kitchen so meals could be prepared for the children and a set of proper toilets.
We are in the process of setting up a wellness clinic at the moment and hope to extend some of the services we presently provide.
