“Remember the Alamo” has been San Antonio, Texas’s battle cry since 1836. A few blocks away, a strip of Commerce Street used to be so full of Jewish-owned shops that locals called it Little Jerusalem. Today, Rabbi Levi and Rochel Teldon are leading a Chabad house in downtown San Antonio to bring that memory back to life.
After 14 years at the Chabad center led by Rochel’s parents, the couple opened CASA Chabad in downtown San Antonio. The name stands for Chabad Alamo San Antonio and, in a city with deep Hispanic roots, means “home.”
It would be hard to find a better address. The center sits around the corner from the Alamo, which draws over 1.6 million visitors a year. Across the street, a $550 million visitor center and museum is rising, set to open in 2028, and the road between Chabad and the center will become a pedestrian plaza full of foot traffic.
“Chabad is here for passersby who weren’t even expecting to have a neshama moment,” Rabbi Teldon said. “People pass by and they come in.”
Many of the city’s Jews have never walked into a synagogue, and the Teldons wanted to meet them where they are. “We want to reach Jewish people that may have not encountered Judaism yet downtown,” Rochel said. CASA, she said, is meant to be “a neutral cultural space that anyone can come into.”
Those who come in are bound to find something. There are weekday lunch-and-learns, a monthly Jewish heritage luncheon, young adult events and a Jewish run club. A gallery tells the stories of the German and Russian Jewish families who built Little Jerusalem. Each Chanukah, a menorah stands in front of the Alamo, seen, Rabbi Teldon said, by tens of thousands.
Once a month, dozens of volunteers gather for Our Giving Kitchen, where 120 meals that local nonprofits deliver to homeless neighbors are prepared.
“It’s a way to bring us all together for a great cause, and show that Jews are doing something positive,” said Jeff R., a downtown resident. “Having Chabad here is huge. It’ll definitely draw downtown’s young professional Jews like myself and help us fully embrace our Judaism here.”
For Rochel, every program, from a tourist’s coffee to a morning at the Giving Kitchen, aims at “a soul encounter.” In the shadow of a shrine to memory, CASA has become a place where San Antonio’s Jews can remember who they are.
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