Rabbi Ari Saks

PERTH AMBOY – I’ll never forget the moment last year when I first walked into Chief of Police Benjamin Ruiz’s office to introduce myself to him after being named the new rabbi of Congregation Beth Mordecai in Perth Amboy.

I didn’t know what to expect, given that this was one of my first experiences as a rabbi after graduating seminary and given that it was one of my first interactions with the police other than a run-of-the-mill traffic stop. While it was one of my goals to become an invested and enthusiastic civic participant in Perth Amboy, I could not have expected the warm welcome given to me by Chief Ruiz into the community of faith leaders who make up the Chaplain Corps of the Police Department.

It didn’t seem to matter to Chief Ruiz what final grades I received in Seminary, or how well I could translate Hebrew. All that seemed to matter to him was that I had a “rabbinate” (the Jewish term for “ministry”) in Perth Amboy, that it was in the best interest of the Police Department to convene as many ministers and rabbis as possible who serve the needs of the greater Perth Amboy community, and as such he wanted me to become a part of the corps. I wonder though if he realizes that through this invitation he made me feel, as a new rabbi and as a new resident, that Perth Amboy could be my home.

That feeling that Perth Amboy could be my home has only strengthened and so approximately a year and a half since that first meeting (and after a thorough screening process to follow up on the Chief’s invitation) I find myself as a deputy commander, tasked to help identify the purpose and mission of our corps.

What I’ve come to realize is that the invitation extended to me, as well as to many other faith leaders in town, by Chief Ruiz helped establish an amazingly unique Chaplain Corps. No other police department has a corps as broad as ours or as representative as ours is of the diverse faith traditions in our local area. Over the past couple of months, leaders of the corps, as well as rank-and-file members, have come together in one-on-one and group conversations to discuss our mission and how to take advantage of our unique, broad collection of faith leaders. While we are still in this process of discernment, two parallel and equally important missions seem to be developing.

The first is the creation of a robust staff chaplaincy program that would serve the spiritual and pastoral needs of the officers within the Police Department. Whether it’s helping distraught family members at scenes of fatal accidents, or providing moral support to officers and their families through the ups-and-downs of careers in law enforcement, what gives us legitimacy as a Police Chaplain Corps is by serving the needs of the Police Department.

As the International Conference of Police Chaplains (ICPC) states as its first core value, “we respect and honor the badge and the men and women who have earned the right to wear it” (www.icpc4cops.org/about-us). Thanks to the efforts of a few of our leaders, we are on our way to fulfilling this mission on behalf of the men and women in blue.

Not all chaplains in the corps though are called to serve the specific ministry of attending to the needs of our officers in the Police Department. In fact, given Chief Ruiz’s openness to welcoming all faith leaders into the corps from the outset, it seems clear that one of the goals of the corps is to move beyond the walls of Police Headquarters in order to convene the larger faith community together. As such, our second mission is to be a conduit for serving the needs of the community.

As we discussed in one of our larger meetings, some of our collective concerns include reaching out to the spiritual needs of the larger Perth Amboy community beyond the walls of our respective houses of worship, working on programs that will help strengthen the bonds that will unify our city, identifying key areas of need to mobilize our efforts within the community, and building a healthier relationship between the residents of our city and the Police Department.

It is this last point, that we as a corps – through our programs, our outreach efforts, and our communication – can help the Police Department and the larger community be more in tune with one another, that links together our dual missions, to serve the Police Department and to serve the community. What’s more, this link seems to lie at the heart of the “community minded” policing methodology for which Chief Ruiz has advocated (see http://ci.perthamboy.nj.us/message-from-the-deputy-chief.html).

According to one research paper,  “partnership is the watchword for community policing efforts. In virtually all discussion of this style of policing, it is asserted that the police must partner with the community and other public and private agencies that serve a local community and that have some impact on community quality-of-life issues” (https://www.ncjrs.gov/criminal_justice2000/vol_3/03g.pdf?q=understanding-community-policing, p.313).

That desire for a meaningful partnership between the police and the faith leaders of the Perth Amboy community was evident from my first meeting with Chief Ruiz whose warm welcome made me feel that Perth Amboy – not “could be,” but – is my home, no matter how long or how short I’ve lived here.

So my hope is that as we continue to sharpen and clarify that kind of partnership with the police, in which the dual missions of the corps– to serve the police and to serve the community – complement and support one another, we will help strengthen our wonderful home of Perth Amboy together.

Rabbi Ari Saks

Rabbi Ari Saks is a Deputy Commander of the Chaplain Corps of the Perth Amboy Police Department and Rabbi of Congregation Beth Mordecai at 224 High Street. He lives with his wife, Rachel, and 6-month old son Jonah in Perth Amboy.