More than 100 people attended Shabbat morning services and another 40 people came for Sunday’s slightly delayed parade to celebrate Twin Cities Pride in Minneapolis this past weekend.
J-Pride, a program of Jewish and Family Services of Minnesota, marked 20 years of involvement at Pride.
“This was probably the most diverse group we had registered,” said JFCS CEO Amy Weiss. J-Pride manager Hunter Wengersky said that there were 12 Jewish organizations registered to take part.
Weiss said Saturday’s Pride Shabbat was “so joyful.”
“It was a small service eight years ago that [former J-Pride coordinator] Heather Renetzky started,” Weiss said. “Now Heather’s one of the rabbis leading the amazing experience.”
While some people didn’t come for the start of the parade due to the thunderstorms that rolled in on Sunday morning, there was still a strong turnout, including Rabbis Adam Stock Spilker, Sharon Stiefel, Samantha Thal and Jayce Koester marching in the parade. Wengersky said the strong presence was important.
“I think a lot of people have seen what’s happening across the U.S. to LGBTQ rights,” Wengersky said. “We need the visibility because no matter how they try to legislate us out of existence, we’re still here.”
The one hang-up of the weekend was J-Pride’s neighbor at Loring Park. The Minnesota Anti-War Committee, an anti-Israel group which has been active in lobbying for divesting from Israel, had been assigned the table next to J-Pride.
By the end of the day Saturday, J-Pride had swapped locations with a neighbor.
“When we called [Twin Cities Pride], they were very responsive,” said Weiss. “We are at Pride to demonstrate our commitment as a community to the LGBTQ+ community. To have this booth next to us meant our volunteers were going to spend their time responding to political questions instead of providing support, resources and connection to people who stopped by the booth. We had a great discussion with TC Pride, and I feel good about how they handled the situation.”
Twin Cities Pride staff did not respond to an email seeking comment.
