I agree, oldsoldier, that we shouldn't need this level of security. But sometimes we do.

Not all of us go to "church." I, for instance, regularly go to a synagogue, as I am Jewish. Truth be told, the US is the ONLY country I've ever gone to synagogue in where there were not guards armed with automatic weapons on site to protect the congregation. (I've worshiped in synagogues in the US, Germany, Israel, Greece, Nepal, Thailand, and Singapore. I even stopped by at the Jewish comunity center in Senegal once, but that was located in the Israeli consulate, so it doesn't count.) Unfortunatly, there are people out there who for whatever reason just don't like us Jews. Just a few weeks ago, there was a group of protesters outside of synagogues in Brooklyn, NY, holding up signs saying the "God hates Jews." Nice.

Standard procedure here in NYC is to hire off-duty police to provide armed security. At the larger synagogues, there is someone full time (often a retured cop who can still be armed), at the smaller ones it's only on the holidays or when something visible is going on.

I was a trustee of a synagogue in Brooklyn for a year, and I have to say, lines of communication with the NYPD were generally quite good. Our local precinct usually parked a car outside the building on holidays or when we were hosting public events, and regularly gave us a headsup if they came across something we should be aware of.

That said, legally armed private citizens in NYC (outside of their homes) are rare in NYC, so we never even considered the option of providing our own armed security. Ushers were always instructed to be on the lookout for "suspicious individuals" and to hit the panic button if necessary. (Silent alarm painic buttons wired to the NYPD were in the rabbis' office, at the pulpit, and near the front door.)