Religion
In 1968, the shul built a one-storey addition to the back of the building to serve as a new classroom. The existing structure had posed a fire hazard. Over time, the once Orthodox congregation has gradually shifted to more of a Conservative mode of worship. The first Bat Mitzvah ceremonies were held in North Bay starting in 1960. Men and women began to sit together in the single-level sanctuary about that time. The Hungarian Rabbi Imre Balla was the last to serve North Bay’s Jewish community on a full-time basis in the 1980s.
Since then, the congregation has relied on regional programs such as Project Areivim, in which young travelling Israelis are partnered with small communities to help with the teaching of Hebrew, religious programs and cultural traditions. Limor and Ronen Hershco came to North Bay in 2001, where they set up Hebrew classes, taught spirited Israeli folk dances on Sunday evenings and were also involved with the Sudbury Jewish community. This volunteer exchange program was established through links with the Regional Jewish Communities of Ontario program. Similar programs allowed North Bay to share the services of Rabbi Avram Avnit with Sudbury in the late 1990s. Rabbi Avnit, of Polish and Hungarian descent and a father of five, had formerly served in Zimbabwe. He made his home in Sudbury, from which he travelled to North Bay to teach weekly classes. There were seventeen students enrolled in Hebrew School in 2002.
