Santa Rosa's Congregation Shomrei Torah paints its doors gold

The color was never in question when members of a Santa Rosa temple painted the front doors Thursday afternoon to make their place of worship even more welcoming.

The main entryway to the Congregation Shomrei Torah synagogue now is golden.

Rabbis George Gittleman and Stephanie Kramer and a crew of brush-wielding congregation members prepped and taped the twin doors of steel and glass, then applied gold paint.

Their motivation grew from the Golden Doors Project, which advocates demonstrating ?support for immigrants by painting gold the thresholds of homes, businesses and sanctuaries.

The color is borrowed from the poem by Emma Lazarus that appears on a plaque affixed to the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty:

… “Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

You can reach Staff Writer Chris Smith at 707-521-5211 or chris.smith@pressdemocrat.com