Our Permanent Rabbi Search

March 3, 2025

We are sharing joyous news:  City Shul has engaged Rabbi Stephanie Crawley as its next spiritual leader.

There is no greater challenge for a congregation than finding its spiritual leader. For City Shul it is a special challenge: we are a unique, passionate, learned and devoted congregation.

Our expedition to find the right Rabbi has been demanding. We held town halls, interviewed congregants and pondered and planned this journey for over two years. Our congregants shared tremendous wisdom. Committees held meetings to deliberate our goals. Our Chalutzim Campaign gave us the resources to find the very best.

The Search Committee interviewed 10 candidates from Canada, the United States and Israel. When we interviewed Rabbi Crawley in late November, she immediately advanced to the front of an accomplished field. Her visit to Toronto in early January confirmed for us that she was the Search Committee’s unanimous choice.  Rabbi Crawley is scholarly, thoughtful and passionate about working with her community.

Rabbi Crawley graduated from Case Western Reserve University with a background in political science, international relations, and Jewish studies.  She is a recipient of Hebrew Union College’s prestigious Tisch Rabbinical Fellowship and served as a Spiritual Counselor at Beit T’shuvah, a Jewish addiction treatment centre.  Her Rabbinic work has taken her across North America and Israel and to diverse regions from Argentina to Azerbaijan.

Rabbi Crawley has served as Associate Rabbi at Temple Micah in Washington, D.C., since 2018.  There, she pioneered projects to transform Jewish experiences for those disenchanted with formal institutions: The Storefront Project, which brought Jewish life into cultural centres around the city, and Open Book, an exploration of foundational and compelling Jewish ideas. Rabbi Crawley is particularly proud of the work she accomplished leading Sukkat Shalom, Micah’s working group on immigration, refugee and migrant justice.  Her ongoing quest is to be a rabbi who is, as she says, rooted, hopeful and fully human. 
 

A native of St. Louis, she grew up balancing softball with summers at Jewish camp, where her passion for Jewish life and community first took root.  Rabbi Crawley is married to Rabbi Jesse Paikin, a Toronto native, and they frequently come to Toronto to visit his family with their toddler daughter, Ruthie. (They still remember first noticing the City Shul signboard outside our once-and-future home, Bloor Street United.) 

Our Rabbi Emerita has met with Rabbi Crawley and had wonderful discussions with her.  Rabbi Goldstein is enthusiastically supportive as great new things happen for City Shul.

“You have built something remarkable at City Shul,” Rabbi Crawley says.  “In just over a decade, you’ve created a thriving, learned, engaged spiritual community in a place where it is so needed. The creativity, dedication and leadership of Rabbi Goldstein has inspired me, and I am honoured to have the merit to follow in her steps. My dream is that when people think and speak of City Shul, they will know that it is a place where Judaism is celebrated joyously, where it is taken seriously and where people are welcomed into a shining example of what a synagogue community can be. We will continue to build this together, and I can’t wait to get started with you.”

We sincerely thank the Search Committee for their hard work.  Our Leadership Team wholeheartedly believes that Rabbi Crawley is the right match for City Shul. With her leadership, we will continue to create pathways to explore and live engaged, connected Jewish lives.

We look forward to welcoming Rabbi Crawley to City Shul this summer, once she says her goodbyes to her current congregation and settles into her new home in Toronto. We’ll provide more information once the calendar is set.  To read some of Rabbi Crawley’s sermons, poetry & kavvanot, visit her website.

We invite you to join us in welcoming Rabbi Crawley with open hearts. We believe City Shul will come to love and cherish her warmth, learning and leadership – of our unique, passionate, learned and devoted congregation.

Jonathan Wyman, Chair, City Shul Search Committee
Barbara Wade Rose, President, City Shul
Liron Taub, Chair, City Shul