Congregation B'nai Amoona is an egalitarianConservativesynagogue, located at 324 South Mason Road, Creve Coeur, Missouri, in the United States. It evolved from a small Orthodox congregation of primarily German-speaking members into an English-speaking Conservative congregation.
Overview
The congregation is an egalitarian (i.e. men and women have religious equality) synagogue affiliated with Masorti Judaism.
The B'nai Amoona Religious School teaches extracurricular Hebrew and religious studies. The Early Childhood Center offers programs for infants through pre-kindergarten. The Al Fleishman Day Camps, B'nai Ami and Ramot Amoona, are modeled after Camp Ramah. B'nai Amoona and the Saul Mirowitz Jewish Day School [formerly the Solomon Schechter Day School] are housed on the same campus.
B'nai Amoona is the only Conservative synagogue in St. Louis that maintains its own cemetery, located in University City, Missouri.
The congregation has approximately 800 families including interfaith couples.[1]
History
In 1882 some members of Sheerith Israel, St. Louis's largest Orthodox congregation, left to form a new congregation which by 1884 was led by Rabbi Arron Levy. From 1882 to 1888, it rented halls to hold services.
In January 1885 Levy was succeeded by 26-year-old Rabbi Rosentreter, newly arrived from Berlin. The first public notice of the new congregation appeared in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch on August 15, 1884, as follows:
A concert for the benefit of the Rev. Aaron Levy, the Jewish rabbi whose congregation seceded recently from Sheerith Israel Church, will be given at Druid's Hall, August 17. The congregation now worships regularly at Pohlman's Hall Broadway and Franklin Avenue, under the name B'nei Emounoh which means "Sons of Faith".[2]
From 1888 to 1906 the synagogue was located at 13th and Carr. In 1893 the B'nai Amoona Cemetery was established.
The congregation maintains daily services with a minyan (minimum congregation of ten Jews) every day of the week.[4]
Youth camps
The congregation maintains two summer camps for youth in the St Louis community, based on age. Collectively known as the Alfred Fleishman Summer Camps, they are Ramot Amoona for older children and B'nai Ami for preschool children.[5]
