Religious Conviction is a Life Sentence

When my husband and I decided to marry, we had to deal with the fact that he was not born “of the tribe.”  It was not quite the issue to us that it was to my mother, who sent me to the rabbi for reprimand, tried to encourage us to live together for a while first (convinced that would break us up), and in a final act of desperation cried, “What will I tell my friends?”  I recommended that she tell her friends that her daughter is getting married, then request that they all celebrate with us in August.  Thus, in the punishing South Florida summer heat, we were married as planned by my uncle’s rabbi who performed his duties, dotted the I’s and crossed the Ts, then disappeared into the corner to drink and tell dirty jokes with the guests.

For many years afterward, religion was mostly a non-issue in our fledgling household.  This was because, for a variety of reasons, we put off starting a family for about seven years.  Once children entered the picture, however, religious dogma could not be ignored.  I discovered that life events lost their meaning to me without the ceremony and symbolism designed to accompany them.  With the knowledge that a son was on his way, we began researching mohels in the area for the inevitable bris, or "brit milah".  To our surprise, San Francisco practiced this most important of all Jewish customs with a distinct “California-style.”  Even local rabbis were using mere physicians to do the deed rather than employing the ordained specialists, who perform not only the ritual circumcision but also the associated naming and blessing ceremony.  To my delight, my husband believed that we should do it “correctly".  We would not, he insisted, conduct a medical procedure in our living room in front of an audience, followed by brunch.  Ours would be a by-the-book, proper ritual.

We discovered the only “true” mohel in the Bay Area, a Lubovitch-variety, card-carrying man of piety and appropriate credentials, who was delighted (indeed, compelled by law) to hurt my son’s feelings at our home on the 8-day anniversary of his birth.  All this, however, was provided that the day in question did not fall on Shabbat—the holy Sabbath--in which case we would need to come to him across the Bay.  This latter condition was very much on my mind as I pushed our firstborn out by 4:45pm on a Friday, clearing the hurdle just moments before sundown began.  The bris was a homey affair in our tiny, just-purchased home, surrounded by our closest friends.  We loved the “old school” style of the mohel, who was so quick and adept working freehand that our son did not even whimper.  And of course he told jokes because, as he explained, “he works for tips.”

I applaud my husband for insisting that our children would have a formal religious education, even if it wasn’t consistent with his own.  We chose not to split the difference when it came to religious identity.  Children of a Jewish mother are Jewish by law; our kids were never “half” this and "half" that.  At each religious juncture, my husband repeated his familiar mantra, “Do it right, or not at all.”

If you are lucky, sometimes your children give you a glimpse of whether your parenting has had any impact on them.  Like all kids, my son went through many phases over the years.  There were "religious" obsessions with scooters, skateboards, videos, T-shirts and hoodies, and of course, hockey.  One day, when he was still in high school, I asked him what the best day of his life was.  Without so much as a thought he said, “My Bar Mitzvah.”  That venerable tradition moved him in ways he was still discovering:  the accomplishment of learning to read from the Torah, the gathering of friends and family to celebrate him, and the connection not only to six thousand years of history but also, by virtue of that week’s recitation of Noah and the Ark, to every other boy who was becoming Bar Mitzvah that day around the world. For the first time, I believe, he was aware that he was not the center of the universe.  It was, as advertised, a true coming of age.

To this day, my son wears the ‘chai’ around his neck that he requested when his friends began getting crosses upon their First Holy Communions. When he visited Israel last summer, he was instantly mocked for his necklace, told it is tantamount to dressing like Tony Soprano or The Situation.  He still wears it, but I noticed that he added to it the personalized dog tags an Israeli soldier had made for him.

This year, Chanukah fell during winter break while the kids were home from college.  On their own, they retrieved the menorah from it's place in the display cabinet, went to the store to purchase candles, and set up a “Chanukah station” at the end of the kitchen peninsula.   One evening, when my husband and I weren’t home by sundown, we arrived to find the array of candles already lit.

I don’t remember beating my kids over the head with religion.   After seeing Schindler’s List we began lighting candles on Friday night with some regularity.  When my kids asked why we started doing this I replied, “Because we can.”  I felt strongly about it, and I explained why as simply as I could. 

There is so much that can be said, not only about Judaism, but about religious belief in general.  I think basic religious education is important if one is to understand much of what is causing conflict across the globe.   I am not qualified to engage in these broader arguments.  I will say, however, that as a parent I have recognized the sense of identity and belonging that my kids have gleaned from their religious affiliation; it is far beyond that which we have instilled in them.  And while religion has never loomed large in our home, I am pleased to discover that it runs deep.