Synagogues Editing and Proofreading Services

A synagogue's High Holy Day appeal letter goes out to the membership with a specific dollar target and a description of what the funds will cover. A member who kept last year's letter notices the stated use of funds contradicts what the board told the congregation the previous campaign actually paid for, raises the discrepancy at the annual meeting, and the board spends the meeting explaining the gap instead of building on the case they had made for giving.

We edit what synagogues produce — High Holy Day appeal and pledge letters, membership dues and financial hardship policy documents, board and ritual committee meeting minutes, b'nai mitzvah family instruction packets, divrei Torah and rabbis' sermons, religious school curricula and parent communications, capital campaign materials, yahrzeit and lifecycle event correspondence, and annual meeting reports and budget summaries. Our editors work on the letter a synagogue's annual budget often depends on landing well.

The High Holy Day appeal letter carries much of a synagogue's annual fundraising in a single mailing, and its failure is a description of need or fund use that a member with a good memory can catch as inconsistent with what they were told before. We work through these so what a specific past campaign's funds were actually used for is stated consistently with what the congregation was told at the time, since a member who remembers a different explanation is the reader most likely to raise it publicly; so this year's specific need and dollar target are named directly, rather than a general appeal to support "the synagogue's mission," given that a member deciding how much to give responds to a concrete ask more than a generic one; so the dues structure and any hardship or scholarship provision are kept separate from the appeal itself, so a member uncertain whether they can afford to give more can find that information without having to ask privately; so the letter states clearly whether a pledge is tax-deductible and what portion, if any, corresponds to dues rather than a charitable gift, since a member's own tax filing may depend on getting this distinction right; and so the letter closes with what a specific gift at a specific level actually funds, not a repetition of the campaign's overall goal, since a member choosing between two giving levels is choosing between what each one specifically buys. A letter built this way survives the member who remembers exactly what last year's said.

Everything you send is treated in confidence, including congregational and financial matters. We are editors rather than rabbis, synagogue administrators or fundraising consultants, and we offer no view on religious practice, dues policy or campaign strategy. What we can do is make sure the letter says only what's consistent with what your congregation was already told.