Lent-Meets-Passover Interfaith Programming
Ash Wednesday arrives this February 26 when we Christians shuffle our feet into Lent. The season coincides with Jewish celebrations of Purim and Passover. Both Christian and Jewish observances bear themes of freedom. Christians look toward Easter in confidence that Jesus’ cross frees humanity from sin, death, and the power of the devil. Jews recall moments in history when they were saved from the brink. As my friend Rabbi Jeremy Markiz puts it, nearly every Jewish holiday can be summed up, “They tried to kill us. We survived. Let’s eat!”
Beginning Thursday, February 27, 2020, everyone in the Lutheran Synod, Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh, and Jewish communities throughout Pittsburgh is invited to participate in an interfaith experience exploring Jewish and Christian themes of freedom. Each Thursday from 7:00-9:00 PM, we will study freedom using tools of study, prayer, and service with Jewish and Christian faith leaders. Let this be your 2020 Lenten practice: two hours a week developing relationships with your ecumenical and interfaith neighbors. Give up your time (rather than chocolate!) and gain knowledge, friends, and new perspectives on freedom in the sight of God.
I was introduced to Rabbi Jeremy Markiz through mutual friends of mutual colleagues. Markiz leads faith formation at Congregation Beth Shalom, a synagogue in Squirrel Hill. Together with Senior Rabbi Seth Adelson and Episcopal Bishop Dorsey McConnell we have developed a number of interfaith events over the years. We do this for the sake of mutual education, understanding, and plain enjoyment of one another. Yet, since the 2018 Tree of Life massacre, recent Hanukkah stabbing, and incidents between and since, we are reminded that stakes are high for Jewish people to exist publicly as Jews, prompting us to urgently develop opportunities for our traditions to connect.
During summer 2019 our partnership led to a 7-week series titled Wholly Holy: Exploring Faith, Practice, and Belonging, exploring highlights in Jewish and Christian life cycle observances. Sessions covered birth and initiation rites, coming of age rituals, daily faith practices, celebrating marriage, ordination, tending the sick, and mourning rituals. Gatherings began with 30-minute presentations, one by Markiz and one by me describing our unique perspectives on the days’ topic, then, an hour of open discussion. As people began to know one another by name, conversation hedged into increasingly daring territory. “Can I touch your collar? How do you fasten it?” “What do Christians think about Messianic Judaism? Are you on board with it?” “Can I be buried in a Jewish cemetery if I have a tattoo?” “What are you looking for in a messiah if you don’t think Jesus is it?” “Do you think Jews are going to hell?”
We always began with an outline for respectful conversation. Participants agreed to “respect and love God so that we do not speak poorly or dishonestly to or about others and their beliefs. Rather, we regard one another with respect, speak well of them, and always explain their actions in the kindest possible way.” If you’re Lutheran, the bells will ring that you just encountered a near-direct quotation from Martin Luther’s explanation of the 8th Commandment. Second, we explained that interfaith experiences do not seek to convince or convert. We arrive for conversation and expect to discover something new about ourselves and our beliefs as well as others and their beliefs.
To that end, we believe that successful interfaith interactions are found in answers to three questions:
What do you believe and why does it matter?
What do those from the other tradition believe and why does it matter?
Did you/Will you spend time with someone from another tradition at least once outside of our scheduled event?
Over 7 weeks we enjoyed the company of over 50 people from different faith expressions. I personally enjoyed coffee with one participant, a widowed observant Jewish man now courting an observant Lutheran woman. How could he practice his faith, she practice hers, and develop a life together, mutually acknowledging one another’s traditions? In concluding conversation, Markiz and I noticed that a primary difference between the Jewish and Christian traditions lies in the ways Jews focus on what they do while Christians are more concerned with what they believe.
We develop these events because, as weighty and wrought as it sounds, we believe it is harder to harm your neighbor when you know your neighbor’s name, eat at their tables, and learn from their traditions. These interfaith experiences are for us all, so that we might know our own faith, the faith of others, and find ways to flourish under God together.
Pastor Natalie L.G. Hall
Canon for Evangelism and Faith Formation / Pastor, St. Mary Magdalene