Big Tent Judaism

Hanukkah: The Gateway Holiday

My friend, Sarah, hasn’t celebrated Hanukkah in years. I met Sarah at Hebrew school, and we share fond memories of celebrating holidays together as teenagers. Yet she doesn’t celebrate Rosh Hashanah or Passover, either. Her fiancé isn’t Jewish, but her Jewish holiday observance lapsed long before they become engaged. It’s not that she celebrates Christian holidays with her fiancé. Rather, together, like so many other American Jews, Sarah and her fiancé celebrate Thanksgiving, Independence Day and other American civil holidays.

Why doesn’t Sarah celebrate the Jewish holidays that she enjoyed as a child, and why has celebrating Hanukkah become irrelevant for so many other Jewish adults like Sarah?

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A Hanukkah Service that Serves

We were excited to receive this flier about a Hanukkah service for families with special needs from Congregation Rodeph Sholom in New York City. The service, which will take place on December 4, will include prayer, song and interactive elements and be interpreted into American Sign Language.

We commend Congregation Rodeph Sholom for opening the doors of its tent to families who in the past may have felt marginalized by the Jewish community. And, we are happy to note, that there are a growing number of Jewish institutions and organizations committed to including individuals and families with special needs.

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An Inclusive New Jewish Cemetery

As we see more intermarried couples within the Jewish community, we will also see more intermarried couples who want to be buried together in a Jewish cemetery. Rules generally bar this practice, forcing these couples, regardless of their level of commitment to the Jewish community, to be buried elsewhere. But according to the Boston Globe, a new Jewish cemetery in Wayland, MA has taken steps to “increase options for interfaith families” who want to be buried next to each other.

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Being Welcoming Without Alienating Your Guests

The website My Jewish Learning has a section called “Ask the Expert,” where readers can submit questions about Jewish life. Among the dozens of inquiries are questions as unusual as what to do about dog food during Passover to questions about why we blow a Shofar during the High Holidays. Recently someone wrote in with a question that’s becoming increasingly common as more families are impacted by intermarriage – what’s the best way to welcome non-Jewish guests to a Shabbat dinner?

As an expert in creating a welcoming and inclusive environment for intermarried families, My Jewish Learning reached out to JOI’s executive director Rabbi Kerry M. Olitzky for some advice.

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Reclaiming a Jewish Ritual

The use of a mikveh, or ritual bath, was for a long time relegated to the more traditionally observant segments of the Jewish community. But over the past few years, Mayyim Hayyim (Living Waters) has been working to re-introduce the ritual into the lives of the broader Jewish community. Mayyim Hayyim, though, tries to be more. It serves as a resource where today’s diverse Jewish family can come and learn about this ancient tradition and, if they choose, immerse themselves in the water. To illustrate the power of taking part in such an activity, filmmaker Jen Kaplan recently produced and directed a short documentary about an intermarried Jewish family using Mayyim Hayyim’s mikveh to convert their child to Judaism.

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Uniting in a Day of Jewish Learning

This Sunday, November 7, Jewish communities across the globe will come together for one purpose – to study. The event, the first ever Global Day of Jewish Learning, was born out of a desire to commemorate the monumental completion of a translation of the entire Talmud (oral law). But it has snowballed into something much more accessible for those not accustomed to studying Jewish texts. It’s a day for Jewish communities to come together and celebrate all of the elements that bind us together, a day to transcend denominations and differences and instead focus on the core of who we are as a Jewish people. But it’s also a day that provides us with an amazing opportunity for outreach to those on the periphery of the Jewish community.

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