this woman’s work

The December dilemma

Nov 29, 2003 Spirituality

Every year my temple does a workshop on what they call “the December dilemma,” which is about Christmas. Since it’s a reform temple, there are many of us in interfaith marriages or who grew up in non-observant (or at least less-observant homes) and so had Christmas trees. I’ve never been to any of the workshops since I’ve read a bunch of different interfaith takes on the December dilemma and have yet to find a solution that really resonated with me. I know my rabbi thinks we’d all be better off to put aside our Christmas trappings and his is a popular — and understandable — Jewish point of view. I agree with him, really. Unless a person can find meaning in a Christmas tree, why put one up? And how on earth is a Jew to find meaning there?

We put up our Christmas tree yesterday and it got me to thinking about Christmas and Hannukah and other festivals of light. I am finally admitting to myself that I do find spiritual meaning in our Christmas observances although I wouldn’t say that meaning is a Christian one. Difficult to believe, I know. Why do you think I denied it to myself for so long? After all, what is Christmas if not Christ-mass? And how on earth could I participate in a celebration of the birth of Christ the Savior if I don’t believe that God had a son let alone that through Him we are saved?

Judaism is essentially a religious tradition based on following God’s laws (halacha). It’s not that following the laws is what makes someone Jewish. No, Judaism is inherited or else you can choose it by converting. Once you are Jewish, you can’t become un-Jewish. At least not according to halacha. Still, following the laws is the difference between being a good Jew and being a not very good at all Jew.

Unlike Christianity, there is no salvation. As to what happens if you’re not a good Jew, that depends on which kind of Judaism you follow. However, in no Jewish tradition is there a need to confess your transgressions and be absolved of your sins so that you will be Saved.

Jews follow the law not because they are afraid of being damned but because they believe in it or because their community believes in it and they believe in — or rely on — their community.

I don’t follow the law.

I don’t keep kosher. I don’t observe Shabbat as halacha demands. I don’t circumcise my sons. So how can I call myself Jewish?

The truth is, I’m not Jewish by Orthodox (and some Conservative) standards. I am the daughter of a Jewish father, who was not (and is not) observant and an agnostic mother. I was converted by a Reform rabbi and such conversions aren’t recognized by most of the rabbis who follow other traditions. Still, I believe I’m Jewish and I believe that I was Jewish before my rabbi ever converted me. I believe that my Judaism was given to me by God and I trust that he meant for me to find my own path in it. I have absolutely no doubt in this. I also know that my Judaism is for me and I am not for it. It is my tool to find my way to God.

We are the ones who bring God to religion. Religion itself is not God. No, it’s rituals and doctrines that illustrate our need throughout the ages to make sense of the universe. Religion itself does not own us; it’s our creation to bend to our understanding so that we can discover our spiritual selves.

According to the book my rabbi gave me to study when I first came to him about my conversion (Liberal Judaism at Home: The Practices of Modern Reform Judaism by Morrison David Bial), to be a good Jew (by Reform standards) I must embrace the things that give me “a sense of kedushah, of holiness.”

I wrestle with halacha personally. I would like to be more observant not because I think that without I cannot find God but because I think that through its demands, I will discover other aspects of myself. In this interfaith family, observation of halacha is pretty near impossible. I’ve decided that this is the challenge that God intended for me and I’ve begun my search for spiritual meaning within the struggle.

Here’s the thing: I have a truth. I believe my truth is, well, true. A big part of this truth is that no one is damned. Absolutely, positively never a need for salvation or to be born again. I think that people who believe in salvation are wrong, plain and simple. However (and here it gets sticky), I don’t think that my concept of wrong is the same as a great universal proclamation of wrongness. I think God — whatever s/he is — is bigger than our puny, human concepts. I don’t know how this works because I’m not God. I don’t really worry about how it works. What I do know is that while I’m absolutely right and that my husband is absolutely wrong it’s also a fact that my idea of right and wrong is human and limited. (For those not in the know, my husband is a Christian.) I trust that on a grander scale my husband’s and my beliefs coexist despite the paradox of them doing so. Therefore, my husband is not wrong but neither am I.

Noah asked me the other day why we celebrate Christmas when I’ve told him that most Jews do not. I told him that we do primarily for three reasons:

1. It’s fun.
2. Daddy is Christian and Christmas has important spiritual relevance to him.
3. Our families celebrate it and they want us to be a part of their celebration.

I also told him that throughout time people have spent this period of winter thinking about light. We talked about the long nights of winter and the way we crave light. We talked about solstice and Hannukah candles and the lights on a Christmas tree. I told him that people create ritual and celebration as a way of honoring the natural, spiritual world around us and to remind us that we are part of the rhythm of the universe.

When I think of it this way, I understand again that our religious beliefs are stories we lay across the rise and fall of our human paths to connect us with the divine. Judaism says that we need God but he needs us, too. As Martin Buber wrote, “How would man exist if God did not need him, and how would you exist? You need God in order to be, and God needs you — for that is the meaning of your life.”

Some will find their truths in halacha or church doctrine, or in the rituals described therein. Most of us, I think, are like me, finding our truths in everyday ways inspired by study, prayer (or meditation), and in the sudden flashes created when events line up just so.

I had one of those flashes today sitting in the easy chair contemplating the troublesome Christmas tree in the corner. I saw the celebration of Christmas lifted from the narrow truths of Christianity and placed in a broader truth that can stretch to embrace my family’s motley religious array. I feel I can honor the best intentions of Christmas — peace, goodwill, and hope — and the homage it is to the natural world of dark midwinter. I understand that these good intentions are packaged in my husband’s beliefs and that this package may seem to obliterate my truths. But I am reminded that it is up to us to assert our truths even as we honor those that belong to others.

I realize again that my duty to my children is not to teach them what to believe — they need to find that in their own hearts — but to teach them that God lives beyond doctrine and scripture. God is present in our searching and with faith and trust, we will find our way.

I imagine that when our children are grown that Christmas will not be a central part of my December life but while I am mothering little ones, I see it as an opportunity to share what is best about religious tradition and to remind us that there is more than one way to God.

I wonder what Noah will believe? My rabbi argues that our Christmas tree will confuse him, that it will force him off a Jewish path. I argue that through confusion we will find our way and that his Judaism will be a part of him no matter where God leads him.

It’s up to Noah just as it is up to me. Just as it is up to all of us.

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