Adam Bellows becomes newest rabbi to lead 173-year-old Temple Israel

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. − In the two weeks since he became the latest spiritual leader of Temple Israel, Rabbi Adam Bellows has accomplished something he hadn't quite mastered at his previous synagogue near St. Louis − he knows almost all of the 150 families he serves.

That's understandable, though, since United Hebrew Congregation in Chesterfield, Mo., where he was an associate rabbi, has some 900 families.

"It's a very different experience for me coming from a 900-family congregation," Bellows said. "Obviously, I couldn't get to know everybody out there. I got to know in four years as many people that I could, to be there for as many people as I could. I definitely had my constituency of people who liked my style of doing things."

Knowing everyone within the Temple Israel family is important to Bellows.

"I'm really looking forward to, intimately, knowing everybody, and I've already gotten a whole lot of names. My goal is to sit down with a lot of people."

On July 1, Bellows became the 45th spiritual leader of Temple Israel, a founding congregation of the Union for Reform Judaism.

"Reform Judaism really puts a strong emphasis on equality between men and women, supporting LGBTQ rights and racial equity, social justice, economic justice," Bellows said.

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Temple Israel was founded in 1849, according to the synagogue's history, when 20 Jewish families settled in Lafayette and sought a place of worship and, perhaps equally important, a place of reverent internment for their loved ones when they died.

The calligraphied names of every rabbi from 1849 through 2017 are showcased in the hallway housing Bellows' office. The names end with a dash after Rabbi Michael Harvey and the year 2017. Bellows and Rabbi Karen Fanwick, who served in 2020 after Harvey, aren't listed − yet.

"Maybe during my time here, it will be updated," Bellows said.

Ordained at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati, in 2018, Bellows served as a rabbinic intern while in college at Rockdale Temple in Cincinnati, and student rabbi at Hillel at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, Temple Beth El in Flint, Mich., and Temple Beth Sholom in Marquette, Mich. He was a Jewish Foundation rabbinic fellow at Isaac M. Wise Temple in Cincinnati, and rabbinical assistant at Congregation Tzur Hadassah in Tzur Hadassah, Israel.

Bellows brings with him his wife, Melissa, and their three children − Max, 7, Lila, 5, and Jonah, who turned 3 on Thursday. Melissa Bellows was recently named director of the Lafayette Jewish Community Religious School.

Bellows earned a bachelor's degree in applied behavioral sciences from National Louis University in Skokie, Ill.

His decision to become a rabbi probably started forming in high school, he said. His mother, who served as a cantor − in charge of the music − during those young, impressionable years, became a role model for Bellows and his sister, who is also a rabbi. His wife, whom he met in Chicago while working at a Jewish organization serving special needs children, knew early in their courtship of his plans to be a rabbi. That decision would involve a year spent in Israel.

"She said she would come with me to Israel if we were married," Bellows said, "so, that was one of my motivations. I knew I wanted to marry her, but this changed the timeline to make that work."

During a tour of Temple Israel, Bellows noted the guitar resting on an easel in front of the beautiful Aron Hakodesh, where the Torah scrolls are kept .

"You could call me the guitar-playing rabbi," said Bellows, who once considered being a choir teacher. "The reform movement of Judaism is very much our style. We have worship music with the guitar."

Bellows hopes his ministerial work travels beyond the walls of Temple Israel and into a community of people who may not ever worship at the 620 Cumberland Ave. location.

"The Jewish community of West Lafayette needs some good Jewish community building," he said, "and just some stability. And I'm hoping to bring those two things together, regularly, to meet regularly. I'm looking to do some interfaith work as well, to get to know clergy of other faiths in West Lafayette and Lafayette."

Deanna Watson is the executive editor at the Journal & Courier. Contact her at dwatson@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter at @deannawatson66.Create a New CopyClose Preview

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: Temple Israel in West Lafayette lands new leader in Rabbi Adam Bellows