London’s Charedi community has told the government of its “shock and pain” at the planned prohibition of religious services and wedding ceremonies during the month-long lockdown due to come into force in England tonight.
In a letter to Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick, Binyomin Stern, president of the Stamford Hill-based Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations, said that communal prayer was an “essential aspect of our lives and health”.
The government has come under mounting pressure from faith groups over the country in recent days to review its proposals on religious observance.
Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis has co-signed a letter with other religious leaders to urge a rethink, while the Federation of Synagogues has also called for services to be allowed.
Mr Stern said it was “painful and distressing, and at odds with people’s lived experience, to hear communal prayer spoken of as non-essential. Across our community, it is one of the most fundamental aspects of daily life.
“You will be aware of the tremendous efforts made across the entire Jewish community to ensure that our houses of worship are safe for prayer during Covid. We know the government needs to make painful decisions, but do not believe that the curtailment of safe communal prayer should be one of them.”
Appealing for the continuation of wedding ceremonies, he said that Orthodox couples “cannot live together until a marriage ceremony has taken place. Once a couple has committed to a marriage date, there are deeply held religious views about the importance of not postponing that date.
“There are couples within our community whose original wedding plans were cancelled during the first lockdown and whose deferred wedding date now falls within the new restriction period. They are devastated.
“What they are facing is not the cancellation of their plans for a celebratory event. It is the extended and prolonged separation from their betrothed, and a sharp brake on the long-planned beginning of the next phase of their lives.
“Of course we recognise that now is not the time for parties or celebrations which allow the virus to spread among participants. In contrast, the core wedding ceremony can be carried out very safely.”
Preventing wedding ceremonies, the Union believed, would be “a disproportionate intervention in a profoundly personal and fundamental aspect of people’s lives”.
Thanking Mr Jenrick for his ministry’s engagement with faith communities, Mr Stern said, “We know you have been listening to our voices and are deeply grateful for that.”
