May their memory forever be a blessing.

If ever there has been a time to come together as a community, this is it.

At 8 p.m. this Friday November 2, the doors of Wilshire Boulevard Temple open to you and our friends of many faiths and cultures yearning to express compassion, process grief, comfort souls, and standup against hate, prejudice, and anti-Semitism.

All of our clergy will lead our congregation along with friends, community leaders and neighbors in a special Kabbalat Shabbat evening service filled with prayer, music, reflection, and connection. We will be joined in worship by special guests, including Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, Senior Minister of the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles Dr. Scott Coleglazier, Executive Director of NewGround and Islamic Center of Southern California member Aziza Hasan, and singers from the Faithful Central Bible Church choir.

As part of one of the largest Jewish communities outside Israel, we feel that it is our sacred obligation to celebrate the humanity that binds us in the face of hate and ugliness that would tear us apart. We are also proud to stand with congregations across the country to #showupforshabbat

How better to honor the lives lost at the The Tree of Life congregation in Pittsburgh than to make this Shabbat special and welcome others to experience the beauty of our weekly prayer service? We come together to make the memory of those who have been murdered a blessing by making holy the Shabbat they so valued.

Join together to comfort others and be comforted; to embrace and be embraced; to hold and be held. Reach in, reach out, and reach up - inward to ourselves and our community; outward to our friends, neighbors, and total strangers; upward to Etz Chaim, The Tree of Life, our Torah, our teachings, and Jewish values that guide our hearts and hands to make the world better and be our best selves.

Come share this extraordinary Shabbat experience. Invite friends and family, neighbors and colleagues - regardless of religion, culture, or tradition. Please share this invitation and fill our magnificent Sanctuary.