Our House - Moral Courage in the Jewish Community
11/16/2016 04:37:19 PM
Nov16
An Open Letter to Our Atlanta Jewish Community:
Leading up to and in the wake of Trump’s election, I have been thinking about the need for moral courage. Some of the most enduring childhood lessons I received from my Atlanta Jewish Day School education were the teachings about moral courage. Moral courage is taking the risk to do what is morally right despite possible inconvenience or adverse consequences. The most uplifting and indelible messages I ever learned about the Holocaust were about the Jews and the Righteous Gentiles that took powerful risks to save others and to live with integrity. They faced persecution, violence, and death. It made me wonder when I was young, what I would do if I was faced with such a situation. It makes me wonder what are young people are learning from us in our community at this moment: Silence?
As a gay Jewish man and a rabbi of a LGBT-founded community, moral courage has become a regular spiritual practice, whether I have wanted it to be or not. In nearly two decades, I have faced death threats, attempts at public humiliation, communal jokes and rumors about me and my community, discrimination and alienation. There are times when moral courage is less about a choice than a necessity. But it has been these experiences that have allowed me to face discomfort, fear and danger and surpass them so that I can take risks on behalf of others who face discrimination and bigotry. At times, I have to remind myself that the ease of speaking up has taken me nearly 25 years to cultivate.
Admittedly, there are still times that I feel challenged. My stance on Israel often angers people on the right of me and deeply disappoints people on the left of me. At times I feel paralyzed by the threat of being seen as illegitimate as a rabbi, regardless of the position I hold. Remembering this helps me cultivate compassion for those of us who are wondering what kind of moral courage do we need to have in the face of this election. Moral courage will mean different things to different people and so we have to both encourage our communities to be courageous and to be patient and supportive of people. Though at some point there may not be such a luxury of patience; which is why we need to balance speaking courageously about the threats of this election with creating opportunities for divergent perspective to speak together in our Jewish homes.
On one hand, Trump’s erratic nature, his words and deeds of bigotry and incitement, his opportunism and narcissism and the people he has begun to surround himself with has created an environment of fear and danger. For Jews, the comparison to other times of authoritarian and nationalistic eras increases our anxiety, which intensifies both the urgency to resist and the fear of significant consequences. While many Jews are out front issuing the call to address the many forms of bigotry and discrimination, there are few of us hearing the prophetic call in our own homes. If we fear for the safety of different at-risk groups of people, how can we be silent?
On the other hand, a quarter of Jews voted for Trump. These voters not only share Shabbat with us in our synagogues and the locker rooms of our community centers, many of them generously underwrite and support the institutions and the programs from which we benefit. This where it becomes challenging to navigate, but we have to reckon that this group is a part of our community and engaged with them as such with curiosity, openness and civility.
Leading up to and immediately after the election, I was in a few of our local Jewish institutions. Twice, I heard people express that they were voting for or had voted for Trump because of their Jewish values; once I heard a celebratory joke declaring this was a sign that the Moshiach (the messiah) was coming. In another, I heard discouragement about their community's inability to talk about the election. It's vital that we discuss the implications of this presidency and its impact on the Jewish community and our country. Division is challenging and frightening, but it is our work to address these issues in our communities, no one else’s.
While I have strong personal feelings about what actions I need to take to stand against racism, Islamophobia, xenophobia, sexism, discrimination against people with disabilities and LGBT people, I also believe that we have to engage our entire community, those who voted for Trump with civility and inquiry. This is important because we have the possibility to learn from one another, refine our positions and build common ground so that we can move forward or become clear about where we ultimately stand. At the same time, our leaders must not suppress their role of prophetic guides. It is a challenge.
We must hold out the goal of shalom bayit, wholeness in the home alongside moral courage. This peace is not an uneasy quiet, but the hard work of being in community. How do we make space to bridge the gap between those who feel grief and fear and those who express relief and celebration? Are we silent out of fear that to even broach the topic that the members of our institution supporting Trump might walk with their money and we would risk losing our communal creature comforts or worse, our jobs and our institutions? Do we shy away because this evokes the ways that we might be complicit and guilty of hypocrisy? Or are we also silent because we have to reckon with our cognitive dissonance that these people are incredibly generous and at times righteous with how they support the community? Can they be both deplorable and laudable at the same time? And what about those who voted for Trump in our communities because of their alienation and fear of irrelevancy or because they earnestly believe that he was the best choice for Jews or their decisions to vote with their bank accounts or their party?
Our inability to sit and address these kinds of complexities is part of why the Jewish community is suffering. When there is this kind of silence, we project into the unknown. Our fears grow. While we may not like what we discover, it has far more integrity to face the truth and make decisions about what we stand for? While there may be consequences, silence and hiding have their consequences too. they are not spiritually healthy for us as individuals, leaders or as a community. Too often silence = death.
We can to do this and stand for something at the same time. More than ever, the Jewish community needs to learn how to handle difficult conversations. With the selection of Bannon and the uptick in anti-Semitic incidents, we are faced with acting on moral courage for our own well-being and survival. It is imperative that we find the way to speak and act courageously and do so without belittling and demeaning others. In my experience, it is the only way to have true connections with people with whom you profoundly disagree.
Challenging conversations are uncomfortable by nature, but we have to remember that discomfort and disrespect are very different. If we cannot even speak about the bigotry of the election openly, how are we going to take even more important steps? Shouldn’t we be guided by the example of our own Rabbi Jacob Rothschild z”l, who navigated the waters of segregation and integration with moral courage and respect? Aren’t those the footsteps of moral courage we want to follow? Despite the Temple bombing, he remained vocal and increased his activism. He worked both outside the synagogue and within it. Neither swayed by contempt or praise, he followed his own compass--and engaged his opposition with respect.
Atlanta, we can do this. We must act like we have no choice but moral courage, because without it now, one day soon we might not.
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