CHAI | The Center for Jewish Life

CHAI: The Center for Jewish Life, funded by the Jewish Federation of Greater Hartford and the Jewish Community Foundation of Greater Hartford, a Jewish community center without walls is the Jewish connection for individuals and families in Avon, Simsbury, Farmington, Canton, Granby and Farmington Valley towns. All are welcome!

We strive to enhance Jewish life in the Farmington Valley by providing meaningful programs and ways for Jewish families and individuals to connect with each other and the Jewish community in Greater Hartford.

The CHAI Center provides year-round interactive programming for families and individuals of all ages including PJ Library Storytimes and Playgroups, Family Holiday Celebrations, Study Groups and Speakers Series, Interfaith Discussion Groups and Outreach Events in Public Spaces like Simsbury Celebrates!

The Mother’s Circle
The Mothers Circle, one of our hallmark programs developed by the Jewish Outreach Institute, provides resources, support and education recognizing and assisting mothers of interfaith backgrounds who are raising Jewish children.  This 16-session course helps these women, their Jewish husbands and children become more knowledgeable, comfortable and engaged in Jewish life. 

Run locally for the past four years in Avon, Glastonbury and West Hartford, thirty moms have graduated from this program funded on an annual basis by donor designated funds at the Jewish Community Foundation of Greater Hartford.

CHAI Happenings, our bi-monthly eNewsletter, is distributed to 600 families in the Farmington Valley and West Hartford. 

We are proud to co-sponsor most of our programs with numerous synagogues, day schools, the Mandell JCC, the Jewish Community Relations Council and the Commission on Jewish Education of the Jewish Federation of Greater Hartford.

We are extremely thankful to the Jewish communal professionals and clergy that lend their time and expertise to facilitate our programs. 

CHAI Center volunteers are committed and dedicated to the sustainability and future of the organization and programming in the Farmington Valley.  Members of the CHAI Center Advisory Committee each take ownership of programs and bring friends and neighbors through our doors.

For more information or to be added to our bi-monthly enews, CHAI Happenings, please email Elana MacGilpin, Director, or call (860) 677-1235.