(Jewish Group) A dilapidated Bulgarian synagogue will become a cultural center

[Behind the Aegis]

A dilapidated Bulgarian synagogue will become a cultural center — and lifeline for a dwindling community

For 40 years, the central synagogue in this port city has resembled the town’s Jewish population — barely existent and rapidly aging.

The synagogue, which was built in the 19th century, is quite literally a shell of its former self. Vines creep up the side of the stone walls and the intricate painted designs on the building’s columns have faded from years of exposure to the elements. One of the domes is missing entirely, the result of a World War II bomb. The roof over the sanctuary is missing, too — not that the city’s Jews have use for it. With about a dozen members, the Jews of Vidin can barely form a minyan.

But over the next six months, the synagogue will undergo a massive transformation, gaining a new life as a $6 million cultural center and community hub — for both Jews and non-Jews.

The Vidin municipality is hoping that the project can do more than restore an old building. The city is nestled in a crook in the Danube River, part of a small chunk of northwest Bulgaria that juts out into a gap between Romania and Serbia. It’s also located in the poorest region in the European Union and, not coincidentally, one of the continent’s fastest-shrinking population centers. (Bulgaria itself holds the ignoble title of the world’s fastest-shrinking country.​​

It wasn’t always this way.

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