The Cure is There if you Look for It

(Photo from crosswalk)

Today's Old Testament lesson includes the verse: "Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there?"--Jeremiah 8:22

Gilead was a mountainous region that was known for its agricultural products, particularly for its healing medicines.

The land of Gilead was known for its balm, a liquid rosin that flowed or dripped from certain trees such as pine, cedar, cypress, or terebinth. Gilead was most noted for the Balsamodendron Gileadense, a rosin-producing tree native to that area. Because of easy access to medicinal ingredients, many physicians made their homes in Gilead.

The Book of Jeremiah laments both the spiritual waywardness of the Israelites and the impending threat of Babylon, which later did destroy the Temple in Jerusalem. (King Nebuchadnezzar expelled the Israelites from the region during the Babylonian Exile that occurred in the 6th century BCE.)

There would be no material balm that would cure Israel's idolatry (the worship of something other than God). Many Christians believe that Christ is the balm that Jeremiah is seeking.

Note: Foster City's Gilead Sciences is its largest public company, currently valued by the stock market at $142 billion. Founder Michael Riordan originally named the business Oligogen in 1987 but changed it to Gilead Sciences when he heard the biblical passage. He could have done worse.

Fight or Flight

Because of the likely election of Zohran Mamdani ("globalize the intifada") to mayor, many Jews are considering leaving New York City. Dovid Margolin, chronicler of Jewish life, points to an example from New York's history that shows that there is an alternative to flight:

What’s different today is that there’s an alternate route for the city, born in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.

From the early 1900s to the mid-1960s Crown Heights was an upscale, mostly Jewish neighborhood: a mix of secular Jews and observant ones, rich and poor, American-born Dodger fans and Holocaust survivors. Then things began to change.

Migration patterns, a massive social-services infrastructure that welcomed dysfunction, and a breakdown in policing destroyed many New York neighborhoods. The newcomers were black, but race wasn’t the issue. It was the gangs, drugs, violence and a pernicious new strain of antisemitism mysteriously condoned by elites. During one three-month period in 1968, 11 Jewish institutions in New York were vandalized, set on fire or firebombed. As in other parts of the city and country, many Jews began to leave Crown Heights.

The "Rebbe" (1902-1994)

The neighborhood, however, was also home to Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, seventh leader of the Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic movement. The Rebbe, as he is known, charted a new course. “A phenomenon has recently spread among the Jewish people, like a plague, God forbid, of abandoning Jewish neighborhoods,” he said at a public gathering in 1969. Panic was causing people to flee, harming those left behind, especially the poor, elderly and infirm.

“People claim there’s no solution, but that’s not true,” the Rebbe said. “To start, one must stand firm and not run away.” He argued that Jews abandoning one place automatically weakened the resolve and position of communities facing similar challenges everywhere.

“I’m very concerned about Crown Heights,” Mayor John Lindsay told the Rebbe when he visited him in 1968. “It is very key to the whole community of Brooklyn.” The Rebbe saw even more: “It is a test case, not only for New York” but for the world.

Many Jews continued to leave for the greener pastures of Westchester County and Long Island, but the Hasidim stayed and planted their roots even deeper. They organized a citizen patrol, built schools, worked to head off the sale of synagogues, and created nonprofits to buy homes and resell them to community members. The Rebbe encouraged the opening of a Hasidic art gallery and a flower shop. He asked that weddings and other joyous events be held within the community to raise morale and support local kosher establishments.

It wasn’t always easy, and not everyone appreciated the Hasidim for bucking the trend. Following the 1991 riots, Al Sharpton dubbed the Crown Heights Jewish community a “Fort Apache in the black ghetto.” But they persevered, transforming the neighborhood again into a wonderful place to live, work and raise a family. In the process, they realized the Rebbe’s vision for saving the American city.

It is ironic that many of the young transplants to New York who voted for Mr. Mamdani live in such places as Crown Heights, unaware that had it not been for increased policing, government reforms they despise, and, most important, the locals who persisted during the city’s darkest days, they wouldn’t have dared enter the neighborhoods they now colonize. They know little about what came before them—and where their ideological fantasies lead.

Santayana's observation bears repeating: "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it".

Supersessionism, and the Reaction to It

Children helped to collect the offering

Today's New Testament reading was from Paul's second letter to the Corinthians (2 Cor:3):

Since, then, we have such a hope, we act with great boldness, not like Moses, who put a veil over his face to keep the people of Israel from gazing at the end of the glory that was being set aside. But their minds were hardened. Indeed, to this very day, when they hear the reading of the old covenant, that same veil is still there, since only in Christ is it set aside. Indeed, to this very day whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their minds; but when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed

(Note: the referenced "veil" is the one Moses wears in Exodus 34:29 when he speaks to the Israelites, who were "afraid to come near him" because his face shone brightly after speaking with God.)

The 2 Corinthians passage is another reference to the Israelites' hardened hearts against God and Jesus in the Old and New Testaments, respectively.

However, Christians throughout history have gone further, saying that the refusal of the Jews to accept Jesus as Messiah means that the Jews are no longer God's Chosen people. This belief is one of the tenets of supersessionism: [bold added]

Supersessionism is the traditional Christian belief that Christianity is the fulfillment of Biblical Judaism, and therefore that Jews who deny that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah fall short of their calling as God's Chosen people.

Supersessionism, in its more radical form, maintains that the Jews are no longer considered to be God's Chosen people in any sense. This understanding is generally termed "replacement theology."

The traditional form of supersessionism does not theorize a replacement; instead it argues that Israel has been superseded only in the sense that the Church has been entrusted with the fulfillment of the promises of which Jewish Israel is the trustee...

In recent times, the doctrine of supersessionism has been blamed for mistreatment of the Jews in the past. Some liberal Protestant groups have therefore formally renounced supersessionism, affirming that Jews and other non-Christians have a valid way to find God within their own faith, which breaks from historic Protestant teaching.

Without elaboration, the lady minister introduced supersessionism to the congregation and pronounced it wrong.

The coming of Jesus wasn’t meant to nullify the Jewish traditions of that time, and certainly not in our time to imply that Judaism is somehow incomplete without faith in Jesus. That understanding can lead to something called supersessionism, or the idea that Christianity is somehow superior and supersedes Judaism.

I wish that she had not dismissed supersessionism so quickly. We are Christians presumably because we believe that our understanding of God, man, and the universe is better explained by our faith than by others. If we didn't believe that--let's not use the trigger word "superior," which smacks of abhorrent colonialism--then why are we in the pews? Why recite the Creed or repent or be baptized?

For over a decade I have believed our church leadership takes positions nearly indistinguishable from the far left wing of the Democratic Party. More fundamental than any specific policy position on Palestine, inequality, racism, etc., I think now that the rot started with the postmodern belief that there is no objective truth, i.e., that my truth, your truth, and the truth of the guy sitting under the tree are all equally valid. The only reality is power, whereby one group's truth is forced upon others.

A Christianity that celebrates the Humble Servant who lays down His life for others has no place in the power- and "social justice"-focused Episcopal Church, and that is one of the reasons the church is dying.

The Greater Intolerance

Bob Casey and Josh Shapiro (WSJ photo)

Two successful, popular, Pennsylvania governors have been sidelined by the Democratic Party because of their religion:

Bob Casey Sr. was one of the most prominent Catholic Democrats of his time. He was also a proven vote-getter in a key state. In 1990 he won his second term as Pennsylvania’s governor by a margin of more than 2 to 1 and carried every county in the state but one.

Yet in 1992 his party didn’t permit him to deliver a speech at its national convention. The problem: Casey wanted to express his pro-life views. The snub came to symbolize the left’s turn away from Catholics, who had once been dependable supporters. While today’s party still includes prominent communicants—including Joe Biden and Sen. Bob Casey Jr.—they have found it necessary to abandon their support for unborn life.

Perhaps Gov. Josh Shapiro’s fate is a sign of a similar turning point. When Kamala Harris on Tuesday announced Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate, some worried she’d passed over Mr. Shapiro because he’s Jewish and Zionist, much as Casey was slighted for being Catholic and pro-life.

Mr. Shapiro is remarkably popular in Pennsylvania, an even more crucial state now than in 1992. His public acts—from spearheading a grand-jury report on sex abuse in the Catholic Church as state attorney general to making a conciliatory statement after the attempted assassination of Donald Trump—have revealed sure political instincts.

Yet many on the left were scandalized that he was on Ms. Harris’s shortlist. They viewed his support for Israel as disqualifying. Activists have labeled the governor—who attends Beth Sholom Congregation in Elkins Park, Pa., and has sent his children to Jewish day school—“Genocide Josh” owing to his criticism of anti-Israel protest mobs and the boycott, divest and sanctions movement. Critics have also pointed to a 1993 college newspaper article that described Palestinians as “too battle-minded” to coexist with Israel.

Mr. Shapiro, who has disavowed that column, holds views that were mainstream within the Democratic Party until very recently. He supports the Jewish state’s right to defend itself but has denounced Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as “one of the worst leaders of all time” and accused him of making Israel “less safe.” That isn’t exactly hard-edged Zionism, but some nonetheless perceived Mr. Shapiro as too extreme.

Christianity has been a whipping boy--not without justification--through most of American history. From the Salem witch trials to Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter, from the Scopes monkey trial to the current pro-Life movement, Christianity has been vilified as a white, patriarchal religion. (The key role of Christians in the abolitionist movement is ignored or played down.)

Now the greater intolerance is coming from the left, which has excluded pro-Life Catholics and supporters of Israel from positions of power. Instead Progressives welcome pro-Palestinians who call for the eradication of Israel and its people "from the river to the sea."

I hope the latter is not what the Democratic Party believes and hope VP Harris denounces this point of view; if she doesn't and becomes the next President, then God help the Catholic and Jewish peoples.

No Light and No Truth

When I was here, Frisbees were flying in April, not invective (WSJ)

When college "protestors" call for the extermination of the Jews, I finally saw how the Holocaust could happen. Throughout my high school and college years the Holocaust appeared to be an anomalous event in human history, when a uniquely evil and magnetic demagogue could persuade millions of Germans that all their problems were due to the existence of a specific race of people. That could never happen to us Americans--we could never blame an entire race for our problems, and we had a strong sense of individual morality that would stop us long before such madness took hold.

When I hear the chant, "from the river to the sea" or "death to the Jews," I think of my college roommate--would they kill him, too? He was the first Jewish person I was ever close to, and I admired him. He came from a working-class Midwest background, a graduate of a public school, and was the son of terrific parents who welcomed this nerdy kid from Hawaii to their home over Thanksgiving.

Nearing the end of our college years, when some roommates and I went out partying, he was studying Organic Chemistry--one of the toughest courses in the entire undergraduate curriculum--in order to get into medical school. He passed the MCATs, attended Case Western Reserve Medical School, interned at UCLA, and returned to his hometown where he practices internal medicine to this day.

He was no privileged member of the patriarchy and worked for everything he got. He was certainly no "oppressor" when I knew him, and his lifelong profession belies the notion that he was ever an oppressor lording it over other people in the hierarchy.

Nor would he, as would I, ever call ourselves oppressed. We were just lucky to have gone to a good college, and I, for one, weep for what it has become.

The Academy Oversteps and Begins to Pay the Price

Bill Ackman, 57, is a hedge-fund billionaire who made his fortune by taking unconventional short and long positions.

He always gives interesting business-related interviews on CNBC, and that, frankly, was the extent of my knowledge about him.

Until he took issue with the December 5th performance of Harvard then-President Claudine Gay before Congress on the subject of anti-semitism and free speech at Harvard, his alma mater.

The scales had fallen from his eyes:

Twenty-four hours after Hamas attacked Israel, Mr. Ackman “saw students supporting terrorists—Harvard students, no less.” With astonishment that hardened into outrage, Mr. Ackman witnessed 34 student groups at his alma mater “come out to say that Israel is solely responsible for the most heinous acts we’ve seen in modern history.”

Harvard wasn’t the only American campus where students railed against Israel and at Jewish classmates. But Harvard was the place to which Mr. Ackman, an “absolutely loyal alum in all respects,” had given $50 million over the years. “I lecture at the university multiple times a year,” he says, adding that he’s on the dean’s advisory board. Observing the protests, and the Harvard administration’s refusal to curb them, he mounted a mutiny of donors, calling on them to help drive Harvard’s president, Claudine Gay, from her job. He feared that her continued presence at the helm would lead angry donors to stop giving. “I am personally aware of more than a billion dollars of terminated donations from a small group of Harvard’s most generous Jewish and non-Jewish alumni,” he wrote on Dec. 10.

Ms. Gay’s resignation on Jan. 2 was a result of her maladministration as well as of convincing accusations of plagiarism in her academic writings.

After reviewing Claudine Gay's, as well as MIT President Sally Kornbluth's and Penn President Liz Magill's, testimony before Congress, Mr. Ackman came to believe that their tepid response to student groups' calls for genocide against Jews was attributable to the DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) practices that have pervaded campuses nationwide. On January 2nd he tweeted: [bold added]

Under DEI, one’s degree of oppression is determined based upon where one resides on a so-called intersectional pyramid of oppression where whites, Jews, and Asians are deemed oppressors, and a subset of people of color, LGBTQ people, and/or women are deemed to be oppressed. Under this ideology which is the philosophical underpinning of DEI as advanced by Ibram X. Kendi and others, one is either an anti-racist or a racist. There is no such thing as being “not racist.”

Under DEI’s ideology, any policy, program, educational system, economic system, grading system, admission policy, (and even climate change due its disparate impact on geographies and the people that live there), etc. that leads to unequal outcomes among people of different skin colors is deemed racist.

As a result, according to DEI, capitalism is racist, Advanced Placement exams are racist, IQ tests are racist, corporations are racist, or in other words, any merit-based program, system, or organization which has or generates outcomes for different races that are at variance with the proportion these different races represent in the population at large is by definition racist under DEI’s ideology.

In order to be deemed anti-racist, one must personally take action to reverse any unequal outcomes in society. The DEI movement, which has permeated many universities, corporations, and state, local and federal governments, is designed to be the anti-racist engine to transform society from its currently structurally racist state to an anti-racist one.

Claudine Gay's resignation on January 2nd was only the first battle in what may well turn out to be a long cultural war between wokeness and traditional values. Claudine Gay not only was criticized for her actions as Harvard President but for alleged instances of plagiarism on her scholarly work.

Neri Oxman (WSJ photo)

The Business Insider then accused Bill Ackman's wife, Neri Oxman, for plagiarism on her 2010 doctoral dissertation at MIT. Ms. Oxman apologized.

Bill Ackman, convinced that the source of the Business Insider report was someone(s) at MIT, vowed to develop AI tools to examine a broad swath of MIT dissertations and publications for plagiarism.

Circling back to the three-presidents testimony before Congress on December 5th, MIT President Kornbluth is the only one of the three who still holds office, Penn's Liz Magill having resigned on December 9th. It would be surprising if she lasts out the year.

After the break is the text of Bill Ackman's January 2nd tweet.


 

Talking about Elon's Talking, Again

On Wednesday afternoon I flipped to CNBC to watch Fast Money and Mad Money, the shows that recap the stock market activity for the day. Instead of the expected fare there was Elon Musk being interviewed by Andrew Sorkin, a reporter for NBC/CNBC/MSNBC. I could not look away.



The most widely remarked-upon section of the 93-minute interview occurred when Elon Musk told advertisers who pulled their ads from X (formerly Twitter) to "go f--- yourself," uncensored on live TV.

The expletive was Elon's reaction to alleged anti-Semitism on a Musk tweet and the alleged placement of corporate advertisements next to pro-Nazi statements on X. He is suing those who made those (fraudulent, he says) accusations and heaping opprobrium on advertisers who believe them. I don't want to get into the merits of the claims themselves except to say that, for the moment, I give Elon Musk the benefit of the doubt that neither he nor X are anti-Semitic.

Speaking of the F-word, some of my former business associates said to me decades ago that their goal in life was to amass "F-you" money, that is, a nest egg sufficient enough not to fear telling off an employer before walking out the door. As we noted four months ago, Elon Musk's total investment in X represents 10-15% of his net worth. Losing that amount will hurt him, but not enough to silence him. When we're talking about F-you money, that's what we're talking about.

The Best and the Worst

Rabbi Myers and the Rev. Jensen

The church at its best: [bold added]

Much has changed since Oct. 27, 2018, when a gunman stormed the Tree of Life synagogue and killed 11 people from three congregations: Tree of Life, New Light and Dor Hadash. The massacre was the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history and left a deep scar in the Jewish community in Pittsburgh...

[Tree of Life] holds its High Holiday services of Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur at [Calvary Episcopal] church and puts on a Purim show there where two priests participate—last year’s theme was the board game Clue.

The collaboration started shortly after the attack, when the Rev. Jonathon Jensen of Calvary sent a letter to Rabbi Myers to offer support, including providing space to worship. “Our home is your home,” he wrote.

Vladimir Putin and Patriarch Kirill (Wikimedia)

The church at its worst:

President Vladimir Putin thanked the Russian Orthodox Church for backing his war in Ukraine as he marked the first Orthodox Christmas since he launched his armies on a full-scale invasion, a conflict he has cast as a kind of holy war against a decadent West...

Patriarch Kirill, leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, said in an interview aired on state TV Saturday that worshipers should see the war as a holy struggle against the West to preserve “the Russian world” and unite Slavic lands under Moscow’s spiritual and political control.

Note: see here and here for previous comments on the conflict within the Orthodox Church over the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The church often exhibits the frailties and wanton desires of men. But it also reminds us of the means of grace and the hope of glory.

It's Tough to Labor On

Mosaic Law Synagogue in Sacramento has been without
a full-time rabbi for much of the pandemic. (WSJ photo)

Eighteen months ago our priest of 23 years retired. We were assigned an interim minister--who has been excellent but according to canon law cannot become a permanent replacement--and have been going through an extensive process, again dictated by canon law, of getting to the point where we could even post the job.

Meanwhile three other nearby Episcopal churches, two much larger and wealthier than ours, are also looking for ministers.

Every congregation who is choosing its leader for the next, perhaps 10, years must be thorough, but realistically how selective can we be? The decades-long nationwide decline in Sunday worship has been matched by a clergy shortage:

For eight years, Keith Mudiappa accepted the challenges of serving as pastor at his nondenominational Minneapolis church—the 70-hour workweeks, the low pay, the calls from parishioners at all hours—in exchange for the joy of seeing people come to the faith.

But the rewards of the job were tough to come by during nearly two years of online-only services. Late last year, Mr. Mudiappa quit and moved with his wife and children to Florida. He now works at a bank.

“I decided I wanted to take care of my family,” he said. “I don’t think I could do that in a church setting.”

In religious groups across the country, clergy members are stepping down from the pulpit.

They say the job, always demanding, has become almost impossible during the pandemic: Relationships with and among parishioners have frayed while meeting only over video, and political divisions have deepened, fueled by fights over Covid-19 protocols.

Though no national data about clergy resignations exists, an October study from the Barna Group, which studies faith in the U.S., found that 38% of pastors were seriously considering leaving full-time ministry, up from 29% in January 2021. Among pastors under age 45, nearly half were considering quitting.

In some denominations, resignations are exacerbating clergy shortages that began long before the pandemic. As the country has grown more secular, seminaries have closed and the pipeline of faith leaders has dwindled. The labor shortage within the clergy, which parallels shortages in other industries, is reshaping worship in some parts of the country as more congregations search for ways to operate without a pastor.

Leaders of the Conservative Jewish movement sent an email to synagogues in December, warning that at least 80 of the movement’s roughly 600 synagogues would be looking for a new rabbi this year; they expected at most 60 rabbis would be looking for new jobs. In the Reform Jewish movement, the country’s largest Jewish denomination, there are 5% to 10% more congregations searching for a rabbi than in a normal year, according to leaders.

Some 3,544 Catholic parishes in the U.S. lack a parish priest, up 25% from in 2000, according to Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate. The Diocese of Buffalo, N.Y., recently launched a pilot program in which as many as six parishes share one priest.

In the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, at least 10% of its roughly 120 churches in Montana are looking for a pastor—and still more don’t have a pastor but can’t afford to hire one. Some are beginning to explore sharing a pastor with other mainline denominations, including Methodists and Presbyterians.

“Pastors are tired,” said Laurie Jungling, the ELCA’s bishop for Montana, who said the departure of pastors from their pulpits began accelerating in the summer of 2020. “They’re giving a lot of themselves to help folks deal with the trauma of the pandemic. They’ve had to face polarization in their own congregations, people’s anger and frustration about masks and vaccines, whether to have worship or not.”

In eight years as lead pastor of Rainier Avenue Church in Seattle, Peter Chin built the congregation from about 200 in weekly attendance to around 700 before the pandemic forced them online.

Over the past two years, the congregation has met almost exclusively over video. Relationships have suffered, Mr. Chin said. Staff have resigned, leaving more work for him, and finding replacements has been harder than it used to be, as the nation’s labor markets have tightened. There are disagreements over vaccine policy, politics and whether to gather in person.

“I love to see real change in people’s lives where they don’t feel hope or don’t feel community,” and then find it at church, he said. “I still find a lot of joy in that. But the scale of it, versus the controversy over mandates, political disagreements, expectations that come with pastoring even in the best scenarios—it feels lopsided now.”

Clergy leaving the pulpit now have more options than they did a quarter-century ago. In addition to those making wholesale career changes, some go into chaplain roles. Others are moving to nonprofits, which usually have more limited hours and emotional expectations.

Noah Farkas had expected to remain a pulpit rabbi his entire career. But after 13 years at a Los Angeles synagogue, he left to run the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles, the largest Jewish nonprofit in the area. It became hard to hold the community together during the trauma of the pandemic, he said.

“You get to a point where, after being in the place for over a decade, and you see your friends and parents of your friends dying, it takes a toll,” Rabbi Farkas said.

Some denominations say the pandemic hasn’t affected clergy staffing. A study last year from Lifeway Research found that evangelical and Black Protestant pastors were more likely than in 2015 to say they were frequently overwhelmed and on call 24-hours a day, but that the rate at which they were leaving the pulpit was effectively unchanged.

Still, more congregations around the country now are learning how to cope without an ordained leader. In the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America in Montana, some pastors serve congregations that are 100 miles apart. Laypeople are trained to lead services when there is no pastor.

Mosaic Law Congregation, a Conservative Jewish synagogue in Sacramento, Calif., has spent much of the pandemic without a full-time rabbi since its prior leader of 25 years retired in 2020. A retired rabbi led services on Zoom from Montreal for months, and congregants filled in for events such as funerals and bar mitzvahs.

The congregation has hired a full-time rabbi who starts this year, but Executive Director Caren Rubin said she has warned members that they can’t expect him to remain another quarter-century.

“It’s like corporate culture,” Ms. Rubin said. “People don’t stay.”

Mr. Mudiappa said he works regular hours now in Florida and earns almost 39% more. His wife, who also worked at the church in Minneapolis, can stay home with their two children.

“I was always on the phone. You feel guilty spending time with your family, because there are a lot of other needs,” he said. “I’m enjoying weekends now. The weekends used to be chaos.”

Our church is looking for someone to fill that empty space.

Priests, like teachers, have characteristics--public speaking, leadership, integrity, writing ability, conscientiousness--that attract high compensation in private industry.

In many cases there would be less stress; being responsible for a parishioner's well-being is more soul-consuming than finishing a project.

Baby boomers embarked on second careers in ministry after finding their secular jobs unfulfilling. With some ministers leaving their initial calling, the pendulum is swinging back,

Save Us from the Time of Trial

Hostages rescued at Congregation Beth Israel,
Colleyville, TX on January 15, 2022 (NY Post)

Writer Mark Oppenheimer says that times have never been better for American Jews who are not overtly religious: [bold added]

for people who are Jewish but don’t do Jewish things, the U.S. is less oppressive than ever. Fifty years ago, there were still meaningful prejudices and structural obstacles that plagued the most secular, non-affiliated Jews.

There were country clubs that didn’t allow Jews (or only allowed a token few), and there were law firms and Wall Street banks where making partner was that much harder for a non-Christian.

But I have been writing about American religion for 25 years, and in that time, I have not encountered a single business, school or social club where Jews are unwelcome. I am sure there are outliers somewhere, but let’s put it this way: The average Jew is no longer worried about being excluded by gentlemen’s agreements at law firms, restrictions at clubs or real estate covenants. These are artifacts of the past.

The anti-Semitism that does remain is more extreme and violent and targets outward and visible signs of Judaism:

The recent heightened antipathy toward Jews hasn’t been focused on the general Jewish population. Rather, it has targeted the shrinking minority of Jews who regularly do Jewish things in Jewish spaces—go to synagogue, for example, or shop at kosher markets...The Jews at risk of anti-Semitic attack will include the small but growing number whose clothes make them targets, like many Orthodox, including Hasidim. Then there are the teachers at Jewish schools, the kosher butchers, the nurses in Jewish homes for the aged.

The decline in synagogue attendance ("only a fifth of Jews attend worship services at least monthly, and only 12% weekly") parallels the drop in church attendance. I wonder how many Christians would attend Sunday services if there was a chance, however small, that their lives would be endangered by an anti-Christian extremist.

Pray that we will not be put to the test.

Good and Bad News: Religious Needs Are Unmet

Rabbi Ari Lamm

Americans' participation in organized religion has never been lower, but Rabbi Ari Lamm believes that

The Prospects of American Religion Have Never Been Higher

A recent Gallup poll included some grim news: Less than 50% of Americans belong to a religious community such as a church or a synagogue, the lowest since the organization began asking the question in 1937. As an Orthodox rabbi, I might feel gloomy about the future of my profession. But the prospects of American religion have never been brighter....

This isn’t news for those of us who have dedicated our lives to the rabbinate or priesthood. The reasons for the decline in synagogue and church attendance range from the changing nature of cities to competition with digital communication. Congregating with others in a physical space is a cornerstone of most faiths—I happily do it three times daily—but there’s much more to religion than sitting quietly on a wooden bench and listening to a sermon.

Seen this way, the new Gallup survey should be read not as an obituary but an opportunity. Religion is ripe for disruption, to borrow a term from Silicon Valley: Plenty of Americans still love the product—just not its current platform.

For centuries critics have claimed that organized religion diverts attention from the fundamental teachings of faith. Churches and synagogues had placed their priorities on soul-numbing procedures, meetings, fund-raising, and socializing.

Lately the emphasis has been on social justice, global warming, systemic racism, and other issues, which, however important, make churches just another political advocacy group. That's not what most people want from their religion.

People attend religious services because they want a spot of religion. Yet worshipers hear too much about climate change, systemic racism and transgender rights and not enough about Abraham, Sarah and Isaac or Luke, Matthew and John. Treating religion like the Academy Awards or the National Basketball Association—which also don’t draw the same attention they used to—has left Americans suspicious about traditional faith. This can be rectified by focusing on what business-school types call the core offering.

Your humble blogger has posted frequently on how the Episcopal Church seems to pursue social justice over spreading the Word in its public pronouncements. Since I composed the above in 2012, it has only become more involved in partisan politics.

COVID-19 upended worship-as-usual and caused churches to initiate or improve virtual services. It offers them a chance to reset. Will my church and other religions seize the opportunity to turn away from the path they were on and go back to basics? Rabbi Lamm is hopeful.

Father Mike Schmitz’s “Bible in a Year” became one of the most downloaded shows in Apple’s podcast app. Tens of thousands of Jews who hadn’t been to a shul in years now tune in weekly to listen to “Unorthodox,” the world’s most popular Jewish podcast. This is as an invitation to every rabbi, priest and minister in America to do as good spiritual shepherds have always done and come meet their flock where they graze...

Services offered during the pandemic were just that—religious services. They were not, as so many felt compelled to offer before the pandemic struck, social gatherings with thin religious veneers. For decades houses of worship had flourished with the American suburb, serving as a focal point of communal life. In Jewish circles, this is known as “a shul with a pool,” suggesting that congregants should see the synagogue as the destination for everything, from Sunday school to a quick swim. This model is fading, and organizations that focus on the heart of the matter—the prayers and rituals and rites—are likely to reap the rewards.

Church conventions that I've attended have always been more about politics than the spiritual needs of the members. Perhaps some of the passion has dissipated now that the Federal and State governments are controlled by politicians whom the church agrees with. So I'm hopeful.

Beer, Conversation, and God

(Syracuse Diocese)

Before the coronavirus people had already begun finding their faith outside of churches.

“pub theology” meetings...have grown increasingly popular in recent years. The modern trend began in 1981, when a group of Catholic priests in Illinois began holding gatherings to talk about God over beer. They called it “Theology on Tap.” The concept soon gained popularity in the U.K., where it picked up the “pub theology” name...

Over the past decade, the pub theology movement has grown to more than 200 weekly gatherings across the U.S. Average attendance can reach around two dozen people. Over the phone, [Pastor Bryan] Berghoef describes a regular pub-theology night in Western Michigan. Scripture from any of the major world religions is read and discussed, as are current events.

A current topic of discussion could be Halloween, which remains contentious for some of the faithful because of its pagan roots. Most Christian denominations are present every week. Jews and Muslims often attend. The occasional Hindu, Buddhist and Baha’i comes by, along with a few atheists and agnostics

The sharing of food goes back to Christianity's founding. The Lord's Supper was a real meal:

It was meant to satisfy the participants' hunger. In principle the idea was that the more well-to-do members of the community would share food with poorer members. This sharing of food gave the Lord's Supper, inter alia, the function of a charity meal.

I suspect that pubs and bars will bounce back more quickly than churches will as America re-opens. Pastors, priests, and rabbis would do well to have conversations about God, with beer, in a place where the younger crowd feels more comfortable.

As Willie Sutton might have said, that's where the people are.

We'll be Sorry When It's Gone

Rabbi Michael Gotlieb of Santa Monica laments the decline in church attendance ("less than half of millennials identify as Christian"):

Jews and Christians break bread in Santa Monica

I pray this trend reverses and Christianity begins to thrive again. The adage “a rising tide lifts all boats” isn’t limited to economics. Historically Judaism gave form to Christianity. A revitalized Christianity can help invigorate contemporary Judaism. When devoted Christians go back to, and advocate for, their tradition, asking and struggling with timeless questions, so too will Jews return to theirs. Judaism never has grown out of a vacuum.

Only religion can provide answers to life’s most vexing and critical questions. Chief among them is whether God exists. This is foundational to issues that wrestle with ultimate meaning, afterlife, morality, human nature, holiness and compassion. When religious institutions lose sight of these timeless questions, they run the risk of becoming outdated and irrelevant.

Modern life is full of distracting pleasures. We don't want to "wrestle with ultimate meaning, afterlife," etc. It's tiring and boring when so many shiny objects abound.

Boomers are lucky; when life crises arise that we can't buy or talk our way out of, there are still enough churches, synagogues, and priests around to help guide us through our struggles. When succeeding generations cry out, perhaps only robots and unblinking screens will answer.

Jeremiah: Relevant Advice

As an infrequent Old Testament reader, your humble blogger was surprised by today's lesson from Jeremiah 29: [bold added]

Jeremiah, Sistine Chapel ceiling

This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: “Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.”

Before the Babylonian Exile the prophet Jeremiah was a haranguer; he constantly admonished the Jews to change their evil ways, to no avail. Babylon destroyed the Jewish kingdom and deported its leaders.

Once the Exile became fact Jeremiah softened his tone and told the Jews to accept their new lives and "settle down". Moreover, they were to "seek the peace and prosperity" of their new country because it would benefit the Jews as well.

If today's migrants followed that advice--and if host nations trusted that they were trying to do so---the world would be a much happier place.

Repudiating History's Teaching

Peggy Noonan: [bold added]

(Babylon Bee satire)

In the past, whether you were racist could be judged by your actions. You held ugly biases, you said or did things that were definitionally discriminatory. The bad news is that you were this way, but the good news is that you could change. You could widen your lens, let some love in, say, think or do better things. You could improve....

Now the idea has taken hold that the charge of racism doesn’t derive from thoughts and actions, from what people say and do, but from who they are. If you are white that accident of birth left you racist, and there’s nothing you can do about it. You’ve got white privilege. You are unconsciously favored, and unconsciously assign disfavor. Either way you’re guilty. No action or word can turn this around.

As American society retreats from Judeo-Christianity due to its failings and supposed irrelevance, religion's precepts are disowned as well, precepts such as:

1) Sons should not be punished for the sins of their fathers; under the new rules the great-great-great grandchildren should be excoriated for the sins of their slaveowner ancestors;

2) Everyone is a sinner, and may God who sits in Judgment have mercy on us all; under the new rules whites are the only ones guilty of America's Original Sin, and good luck trying to obtain mercy from the latter-day Puritans who sit in judgment.

Unlike their science and technology counterparts, the culture vanguards don't seem to be intent on building upon history's teaching but repudiating it.

Jesus: Worth a Try

The Circumcision (Rubens)

A question rarely posed: Is Jesus Good for the Jews?

(It's not the same as asking if Christians are good for/to the Jews.)

Art Lamm of Yeshiva University notes that anti-Semites periodically try to deny Jesus' Jewishness: [bold added]

In the early 20th century, the anti-Semitic and racist German-British philosopher Houston Stewart Chamberlain argued that while Judaism provided the religious background for Jesus, he “had not a drop of genuinely Jewish blood in his veins.” The Nazis picked up on this thread. As Hitler consolidated power, German theologians insisted that Jesus was not a Jew but an Aryan, descended from Galilean gentiles.

In the context of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has sought to sever Jesus’ religion from his nationality or ethnicity. In a 2014 Christmas message, Mr. Abbas called Jesus “a Palestinian messenger of love, justice and peace.” This remains a common refrain from anti-Israel activists.

Not surprisingly, Jews throughout history have defended themselves by referring to Jesus' origin, without endorsing his teachings.

Take the Spanish Rabbi Simon Duran, born in 1361 and known affectionately as “Rashbatz.” Duran’s community suffered intense Christian persecution. In attempting to counter increasingly dangerous Christian threats to Jewish religious observance, Duran and his contemporaries emphasized the Jewishness of Jesus and the apostles. Appealing to passages in Matthew, Luke and the Book of Acts, Duran argued that Jesus and his followers believed the Jewish people should continue to adhere to Jewish practice.

After citing other examples, Art Lamm concludes:

When the need arises, Jewish thinkers have not been bashful in accentuating Jesus’ Jewishness—whether in religious, ethnic or national terms. As Jews increasingly come under attack in Europe and elsewhere, they should once more be prepared, if necessary, to assert Jesus the Jew, even as they have no wish to claim Jesus the Christian.

While this aspect of Christian-Jewish history is interesting, it's easy to overlook its relevance to outsiders whose groups may find themselves in conflict. The modern defense is to call the attacker a racist, a sexist, a class-ist, or some other variation of "-ist". The idea is to condemn the opponent morally; if it works, the weight of social media and even law enforcement can be brought to bear against the attacker. Name-calling may succeed in beating down opponents, but it doesn't bring them closer.

The "Jesus-was-a-Jew" defense holds that potential. It begins by showing how much one group (the Jewish people) is like a person (Jesus) whom the other group (Christians) admires. Common ground is emphasized, not moral superiority. It's worth a try--it can't be worse than what we're doing now.

The Great Divide: Thoughts and Prayers

Tree of Life synagogue (Chronicle/AP photo)

The shooting started at 9:50 AM Saturday. The first 911 call was at 9:54. At 11:13 the gunman, Robert Bowers, was taken into custody.

Eleven worshippers at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh were killed, and four police officers and two others were wounded.

Newspaper and television commentators immediately looked at the massacre through the prism of politics--gun control, anti-Semitism, whether inflammatory speech triggers violence, and what effect the event could have on the mid-term elections. While your humble blogger does have political opinions, politics is not the be-all and end-all of existence.

Cannot the families be allowed to mourn a terrible loss that is far more important to them than who wins the seat in their Congressional district?

As for me they will have my thoughts and prayers.

Note: the above is one more example of the world-is-divided-into-two-groups trope, in this case those who believe "thoughts and prayers" are worthwhile and those who believe that they are useless. To the former, prayers are meaningful because there is a Deity who is listening (how or whether prayers are answered is a different question, but the fundamental premise is that Someone is receiving them at the other end). In the latter group it's possible that there are a few who believe that there is a God who is totally uninvolved in the Universe, but I suspect that most members do not believe in God.

The Great Divide is about much more than which party should be in office or the correctness of a court decision, it's about whether human life has meaning beyond death, in fact beyond the existence of the human race itself. It's about thoughts and prayers.

The Ear of the Listener

Sacrifice of Isaac, 1527 (Cleveland Museum)

Eid al-Adha (9/1/2017) is one of Islam's great religious festivals.

Eid al-Adha commemorates the Koranic tale of the Prophet Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his son Ishmael as an act of obedience to God. Before he could carry out the sacrifice, God provided a ram as an offering.

In the Christian and Jewish version of the story, Abraham is ordered to kill another son, Isaac.

The Economist ruminates on the differences of each faith's interpretation of the story: [bold added]

the Islamic tradition generally holds that it was not Isaac but Ismail, Ibrahim’s son by the maidservant Hagar. Muslim commentaries on the story often stress that Ismail as well as his father clearly consented to the act of sacrifice; it was not an unpleasant surprise for anybody. These interpreters also emphasise that it was never conceivable that God would want Ibrahim’s son to be killed. Indeed part of the story’s point is to denounce the whole idea of (involuntary) human sacrifice....

Early Christian commentators invariably see the story as a foreshadowing of the death and self-sacrifice of Jesus. This is seen as an act of disinterested service to humanity by both God the Father (who offered up his offspring) and God the Son (who offered his own life). Abraham’s kindling wood is seen as hinting at the wooden cross on which Jesus would die. It is an important aspect of the Christian story that Jesus could have avoided being crucified, but nonetheless freely chose to undergo death so as to break death’s power. In the Genesis narrative, Isaac does not seem to have had much say in his fate....

Many Jewish commentators, like Muslim ones, have seen the story as a tirade against human sacrifice, which had been a feature of many pre-Abrahamic religions. Some Jewish interpreters see the most important words in the story as Abraham’s response to God—“here I am” or in Hebrew “hineni”—an expression which is held up as a model of obedient and attentive listening.

If one's goal is to grasp a 30-second version of the story, the three interpretations are distinctions without a difference. But if one is at all interested in the notions of free will, obedience to the divine, and the meaning of sacrifice, then there is something to learn from each faith's perspective.

(The Genesis passage is below the fold.)