Back after a break: Grassroots Jews returns this year to offer a different kind of Yom Kippur

Daniel, who grew up in the United Synagogue, went to yeshiva in Israel for two years and helped to co-ordinate Grassroots for the two years before it took a break.

Jen, who is from Leyton Buzzard, is not Jewish but after coming to London and meeting Daniel, came to Grassroots in 2023. “It was my first time in shul. It was incredibly welcoming. People helped me to participate, explaining what was going on and showing me what page we were on.”

Since then, she has been “exploring different Jewish spaces for the last three and a half years”.

Grassroots, she says, aspires to be “an inclusive space where anyone of any background can be involved”.

Its services are modelled on those of an Orthodox partnership minyan, enabling women to take part within certain halachic parameters. The group famously introduced the “trichitzah” to the community, with spaces for both separate male and female seating, as well as for men and women to sit together.

As well as the main service, “there’s also parallel programming – it could be a more Progressive prayer space, or yoga, or a meditation experience,” Daniel says. “There’s a grief workshop as well.”

It will also have “a children’s offering” too.

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Daniel, who was a regular since 2014, says: “I know how to daven and to leyn so I found myself getting involved in the ritual side.”

Last year, he went to a young Masorti group over the High Holy Days - “it was welcoming but it felt like someone else’s shul, I felt I was missing Grassroots.”

Such has been the response to the return that the slots for the parallel programme roster and leading services are almost full.

But there is always room for more volunteers - services are held in a tent, which will be decorated with artwork. “We want to make it beautiful and intimate,” Daniel says.

While the focus is on accessibility, he stresses, “we don’t want to exclude people by cutting out important parts of the service/ We want the programme to be well-led. Competence is important for us.”

There is a “well-oiled system” for helping people who want to learn how to lead prayers, he adds.

Since everyone is a “once a year” attender at Grassroots, says Jen, “it doesn’t feel like it’s someone else’s shul”.

Daniel adds, “We recognise that we are an unusual couple to be leading a Yom Kippur service but we hope that it represents what Grassroots is about.

“We are going to run it next year so there should be some continuity as well.”

Tickets can be obtained from www.grassrootsjews.org