RED THURSDAY TO FEATURE THE SYMPHONY — First it was the World Series and now, the NFL! In case you hadn’t heard already, the Kansas City Chiefs have invited the Kansas City Symphony to perform “The Star-Spangled Banner” on Sept. 17 in conjunction with the 2015 “Red Thursday” home opener versus the Denver Broncos on CBS’ Thursday Night Football. Music Director Michael Stern will not only conduct the Symphony but also lead the Arrowhead Stadium crowd in singing the national anthem.
SHABBAT MEAL AT EUROPEAN MACCABI GAMES SETS GUINNESS RECORD (JTA) — A Shabbat meal at the European Maccabi Games has broken a Guinness World Record.
Some 2,322 Jewish men and women gathered last Friday night (July 31) for a meal held by Chabad-Lubavitch at the games in Berlin, Chabad.org reported, making it the largest Shabbat meal ever. {mprestriction ids="1,3"}Rabbi Yehuda Teichtal, (and brother of KU Chabad Rabbi Zalman Tiechtel) the head of Chabad in that German city, presided over the festivities.
The gathering broke the mark of 2,226 set in June 2014 at an event hosted by White City Shabbat, a Tel Aviv organization that hosts and coordinates Shabbat meals. That meal also was co-sponsored by Chabad-Lubavitch.
The record-breaking meal was the project of Alon Meyer, the president of Maccabi in Germany, and Robby Rjber, vice president of Makkabi Deutschland.
“There was much more than meets the eye,” Chabad rabbinical student Shneur Volfman of Oak Park, Michigan, who volunteered at the games as part of the Roving Rabbis program, told Chabad.org about the Berlin event. “Even giving out kippahs. It may seem simple, but when you realize how many people there were, you see it’s a big deal.”
STUDY: N.Y., BOSTON AND MIAMI ARE AMERICA’S 3 MOST JEWISH CITIES, NEW YORK (JTA) — New York, Boston and Miami are the three most Jewish cities per capita in the country, according to a new analysis of data gathered last year by the Public Religion Research Institute.
Eight percent of New York City residents are Jewish, followed by Boston at 6 percent and Miami at 5 percent, according to the data. Philadelphia and San Francisco each are 4 percent Jewish, and Chicago and Washington are 3 percent Jewish.
Nationally, 2 percent of all Americans are Jewish, according to the study. Los Angeles, which by raw numbers is believed to house the country’s second-largest urban Jewish population, is just 2 percent Jewish, the analysis found.
Ranked by state, New York and New Jersey tie as the most Jewish, with 6 percent of residents in both counted as Jews. Next are Massachusetts (5 percent) and Maryland (3 percent), followed by California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Vermont each with 2 percent.
Ranked by region, the Northeast is 4 percent Jewish; the Midwest, South and West each are 1 percent Jewish.
The analysis is based on data collected in some 52,741 telephone interviews conducted in 2014 as part of the Public Religion Research Institute’s American Values Atlas.
Overall, the largest urban religious group is Catholics, who are No. 1 or tied for the top spot in 15 of America’s top 30 metropolitan areas. Religiously unaffiliated make up the top “religious group” in 10 of those metro areas, and white evangelical Protestants are the plurality in six of the major metro areas. Atlanta is the only major metro area with a different group at the top: black Protestants.
Nationwide, Nashville, Tennessee, has the largest percentage of a single religious group, with 38 percent of all residents identifying as white evangelical Protestant.
The least religious city appears to be Portland, Oregon, where 42 percent of respondents identified as religiously unaffiliated. Two percent of the city’s residents are Jews.{/mprestriction}