A moment of reflection

 

I don't talk much about my faith here, as it's something that I keep close. It's not for fear, but a respect for the few who chose to read my rants and while I don't know any of you, I can be all but certain that you're not Jewish. The Tribe is small.
But as it so happens, the Jewish and Gregorian calendars meshed and Pesach (Passover) and Easter fall in the same week. Two holy days of the religions of Abraham happening so close when our calendars are out of whack is infrequent so as such, I'm prone to reflection. What's funny and sometimes forgotten is that Jesus of Nazareth, the mensch that he was, was celebrating Passover for the Last Supper.

Religion is under attack in this country. What's tragic about it is it's not those on the outside that are the most worrisome. It's those inside it that are eating it alive and making it but a shell of what it was supposed to be; a way to live your life to honor the teachings of G-d.
And so you don't mistake me for pointing fingers, I'm equally to blame. As a Jew, I'm supposed to keep kosher. It's a simply-complex set of dietary guidelines and I don't keep to it except on Shabbat (Sabbath) and even then I sometimes fall off the wagon. Bacon, cheeseburgers, barbeque, etc... I don't have the self-discipline to just say no. In the grand scheme of things, this is minor. As are my tattoos (another law against those for Jews). The bigger issues, and for this I will point fingers, are when it comes to the most holy of days for our religions.

The commercialization of the birth and death of your savior, Christians, that's all on you. Yes, yes, I know, it's been happening for decades, but you know you feed into it. How many gifts do you give to your children/spouse/friends/family/etc... for Christmas? You spend so much time shopping and toiling for "the holidays" that you forget why you're doing it. Sure, you go to church on or around the day, but think deep: do you really do it because you are truly celebrating the birth or is it because it's expected?
Easter - How did you let a pagan symbol (the rabbit) take charge of what for you should be THE MOST holy of days? It's become about candy and eggs and candy eggs and pastels and... come on?? When I was young, I remember that at around the time on Good Friday when Jesus was said to have died on the cross (around 3:00pm - though they did it using local time), the churches in town would all ring their bells, symbolizing his crying out as he gave up his spirit. I don't hear of this happening anymore.

For Jews, we, I feel, defile our most holy of days, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, in a worse way. The temple I belonged to up north; the founders of that temple wanted the doors to be open for all who wanted to come and worship and celebrate the Torah. You didn't have to become a temple member, unless you wanted to be a board member. No pressure to give or anything. Come and worship and if you feel at home, maybe you'll wish to help support the temple. That's what I did. I came to temple to pray and to learn, but as I felt closer and closer to the people, I wanted to help, so I willingly became a member and wound up on the board of the temples' brotherhood (think mens club). During the High Holy days, I saw people I'd never seen all year come to pray. And that's how we were.
But outside of those few bastions of welcoming, there is the concept of "Pay To Pray". Many, many temples sell tickets for the services for Yom Kippur and Rosh HaShanah. I fully understand that these are intense undertakings for most temples (2 days of prayer each, with multiple services, and after the last service on Yom Kippur, a break fast), but to demand "tribute", if you'll forgive the term, so that you can join fellow Jews in praising HaShem for creation (Rosh Hashanah) and then begging him for mercy on your sole and asking for forgiveness (Yom Kippur) makes me uncomfortable. Like the things HaShem commands of us, if I undertook them willingly, that is donating to the temple to help them put these on, I'd probably give more than they charge for tickets. But like too many Jews, who lose the concept of tikkun olam (freely translated, it means heal the world -  healing the afflicted, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, comforting the bereaved) by demanding government take these actions through theft of the peoples labor (I.E., taxation), they've lost the idea that the shul (synagogue) is a place of worship and charging admission is skeevy.

If those of us who have faith don't reclaim our religions, then the secularists will be more than happy to pound them to dust.
And I don't mean we all have to drop our lives, study Torah for hours on end or become monks or missionaries and devote our lives to living the Bible completely. But we need to realize what our faiths are and what it is about our chosen religions that make us proud to say we're Jews or Christians and take that back.

L'shalom, my Christian friends.