Going Home

My wife and I recently went to my hometown to visit my aunt. This trip like all the others was a time traveling adventure in which I could show my 3-year-old daughter where I grew up and favorite haunts as a child. We had a great time up until my aunt took us to lunch, only then did it become awkward to the point of having to defend my religious and cultural choices.

To give all readers a background, I was born into a Southern Baptist family. My father was a Southern Baptist preacher, my brother was a missionary, my mother's family was very devout and when I couldn't find someone at home, I could usually find them at church. I was not however the only member of my family to leave the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), in fact I was the third.

First there was my father, he left my mother when I was three to find himself, where he found himself was in the Unity Church a holistic approach to Christianity that many people think of as New Age. Then there was my brother who became a Seventh Day Adventist, after leaving the SBC he found himself in a stronger connection with his wife by joining her church and sharing the same doctrine. Finally I was mentally never really part of church life, my mother tried to engage me in youth groups and such but I never really belonged or had ownership in any part of the church. When I came out at bisexual, and then transgender the connections that my mother had tried to make for me in the church altogether vanished. In a way I was persona non grata, shunned by the place that had tried to be welcoming when I was perceived as normal.

My paternal grandmother who had been "half" ethnically Jewish (Ashkenazim), I didn't ever meet her but I did know about her families loss of Jewish identity in the Midwest. My father talked about it sometimes, mostly as a factoid over dinner with his acquaintances from Unity. Some would think that this would be the reason for my conversion but my hidden ancestry was only a small part of why I converted to Judaism. Another big part of my conversion was the fact that I have identified with otherness for as long as I can remember. One could say that I was no stranger to the sense of otherness. Growing up in a family with very strong religious convictions and a strong sense of what was acceptable and not, I struggled with internal pressure to conform to the hetero-normative ideal.

Here I am again feeling like a 15 year-old and my aunt has me on the ropes over all of the identity politics that come into play in my life again. The questions started out innocently enough directed at my wife, what are you doing with your life these days, how is your family, isn't your mother Christian, why is she Christian and your Jewish, the questions got deeper once they found out that Shelli had met me at my synagogue, yes you guessed it I converted totally on my own! Apparently my mother had neglected to tell my aunt that I was in the conversion process well before I even met my wife, that I had considered Orthodoxy a full three years before meeting my wife at my then Reform shul. This sort of hiding is what my mother does best, "If we don't talk about it, whatever it is doesn't exist."

At that point the conversation returns to me and she asks my why a good Christian kid from a good Christian family becomes a Jew. She started to blame herself for not being welcoming enough, and tried to proselytize me while my wife was taking my daughter for a walk. And when my wife came back she tried to witness to her as well. At which point my wonderful, amazing and altogether stunning wife said this, "It is my belief that there are many ways up the mountain, and yours is just one of them." This reminded me of why I love Shelli so much and this brilliant conversation stopper was perfect because my aunt nodded and we continued talking about everything but religion. This lesson in religious pluralism is one that my family of origin should take to heart. Just because I believe something that is in conflict with their belief system doesn't mean that all of us have to but heads over religion.

Over all it was a good trip, once my aunt backed off with the proselytizing, Sadie got to see her aunt and I asserted my identity once more. Yet I feel that I missed an opportunity to talk with my aunt on a more in depth level about my Jewish identity and how it is much more than religious, it is also cultural because I can look back through my ancestors and see the change from being religious Jews in Germany to ethnic Jews in the Midwest and finally to the pews of churches as congregationalists assimilating into the great American melting pot. I am not just a preachers kid who rebelled, I am a lost son of Israel returning home to the roots of my tree of life. Perhaps, this would have angered her, perhaps not. If my family of origin could only see what a life I have found within Jewish community, maybe they would stop the proselytizing nonsense and just accept that I am a Jewish man through and through.