Adventures in Jewish leadership

[liv]

Over the course of this weekend:

• A young Russian Orthodox man told me I was a beautiful mother and he wished that I could be blessed with many children if I didn't have them already. At this point, all he knew about me was that I am female, and I had just led an impromptu ten minute discussion on the opening saying from Ch 2 of Pirke Avot, the section of the Mishnah on ancestral ethics.
• An elderly Catholic man asked me to show him all the key parts of the synagogue's architecture and furnishings so that he could see what was similar to his church. I was a little reluctant since the reason we were in synagogue was for a memorial service and it didn't seem quite the moment for touristing, but he didn't actually ask in the middle of prayers and the regulars said it was ok to give him the tour.
• A secular woman decided that since I know how to say all the "special words in Hebrew" I should also make the decision about whether it's ok to cut corners in making tea for large numbers.
• A middle-aged Jewish widow gave me a huge bouquet of roses to thank me for leading the prayers for her late husband's stone-setting.

So, um, I definitely feel appreciated, even if some expressions of appreciation are more welcome than others...

Comments

[jesse_the_k]

Never a dull moment.

I'm intrigued re: what corners are to be cut making tea? Half as many tea bags for twice as long?

[liv]

So bearing in mind this is a British synagogue, the woman wanted to miss out bits of the ritual such as: warming the pot before adding the teabags and boiling water; and adding the milk to the cups first before filling up with tea. I hope I can be forgiven for saying she could skimp on those bits...

[seekingferret]

?מנהג בּריטניה תרה היא

[liv]

:-p

[siderea]

Ah, she wanted a halachic opinion from the British minhag! That makes perfect sense.

[nicki]

Sorry about the Catholic guy. We are spoiled and used to being able to access the public spaces of our churches at all times, but that doesn't preclude being culturally sensitive to others. (I was, for example, absolutely appalled at the restrictions at the Duomo in Florence this summer.)

[liv]

I think he was mainly curious and wanted to learn, and didn't mean to be insensitive. My impression is that Catholics don't generally hang about after services socializing the way we do, so there might not be any equivalent in his tradition of the space which he used for asking questions. They were friendly and respectful questions, just I was in supporting the mourners rather than educating visitors mode.

It's a shame that the Duomo isn't accessible. I went there purely as a tourist to look at the pretty art, so I didn't feel particularly restricted, but it seems sad if you're actually Christian that you can't access the cathedral properly. Do you know the reason for the restrictions, is it because it's such a major international tourist spot that they can't preserve the building if they just let everybody wander all over it?

[alextiefling]

My impression is that Catholics don't generally hang about after services socializing the way we do

Right. This is a major social difference between Anglicans and Catholics. I was only half-joking when I told a (then-)Catholic friend that tea and coffee after the service was itself a ritual element with sacramental qualities. I took her to Communion at Grace Cathedral, San Francisco, which is simultaneously extremely ritualistic and extremely trendy. She took one look at the commercial coffee outlet providing the after-service drinks, and said 'I can do this at home for less', so we left.

In High Anglican tradition, there probably isn't tea and coffee after the simple 8am service for busy people, but there's only one all-bells-and-whistles service that has no refreshments after it, and that's the Stripping of the Altars on Maundy Thursday.

[liv]

Yeah, feeding people after a service is pretty important to us too, it's very much part of the ritual. (I mean, we do things a bit weirdly because our cemetery is in the synagogue's grounds like a more typical churchyard. You wouldn't normally have the food actually in the cemetery building like that, just that our synagogue has a double function.) The food is definitely important, and the milling around being social is not trivial as it may appear, it's part of offering comfort to the mourners.

But I can completely understand someone thinking, ok, the actual service is over now, it's a good time to ask my questions. It's interesting that not seeing the significance of the social part after the formal liturgy is a particularly Catholic thing. My curious guy was also quite impressed that his community and mine have similar debates about whether the person leading should face the congregation or the ritual centre. Oh, and he got v excited about the perpetual lamp and said something about Presence which I don't think is quite the right analogy but I wasn't with it enough to address that.

[alextiefling]

Re: The perpetual lamp - what's the one in the Synagogue intended to do or represent, if you don't mind my asking?

[liv]

It reminds us of the perpetual lamp that was lit every day in the Temple. The Ark with the Torah scrolls has lots of Temple imagery, including the scrolls themselves wearing robes and crowns to represent the priestly garments.

[alextiefling]

That makes sense; in Catholic and Anglo-Catholic custom, similar imagery surrounds the 'reserved sacrament' - the pre-consecrated ritual elements of the Eucharist. In theory, they're kept on hand in case someone needs them urgently. In practice, they're the focus of a great deal of ritual veneration. The small cupboard in which the elements (usually just bread) are kept is referred to as a sacrament-house or tabernacle, and often has an ornamented curtain drawn across its front. The altar behind which the sacrament-house sits is treated with special reverence - it is to this spot that a worshipper genuflects when arriving and departing - and it is here that the perpetual light is kept burning. If a church has a separate side-chapel available, the sacrament is often reserved there, instead of in the main church. And yes, to many people (I am not one of them) the reserved sacrament is a special manifestation of the Divine Presence.

So there are many - largely deliberate - parallels, but equally I can see immediately why you'd feel it doesn't really line up as well as the Catholic visitor may have thought.

[atreic]

Learnt something! I read 'pre consecrated' as 'before they are consecrated' and wanted to go 'no, that's wrong, they're not reserved before consecration, they're reserved afterward!' and then googled and realised it means 'consecrated in the past, ie not at the time of use'

[nicki]

The level of sociability depends on the parish. I've been in parishes that did the donuts and coffee thing after Mass and ones where everyone immediately fled. :P

The Florence Duomo is the MOST inaccessible Catholic church I have EVER been in (and I've been in a lot of Catholic churches) and there weren't many (for a touristy Church in July) people there. It felt personally offensively inaccessible AND I felt offended on the part of Catholics everywhere. It actually made me angry. Other than the Dome climb, it isn't even that interesting or awe-inspiring as a Church. The Duomo in Milan felt far more celestial(?) and it had a fabulous historical connection with its basement archeological dig. I could really feel the continuity back to the early Church. St. Marks in Venice was almost as restricting as Florence, but at least there you could see why (gobs and gobs of tourists) and you could still get around to see the entire thing, despite the cordoning off. You can wander freely in St. Peters in the Vatican (or you could when last I was there), Notre Dame in Paris, the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, the Cathedral in Seville, and almost every single Catholic church I've ever been to.

[silveradept]

That's appreciation, certainly, although not necessarily the kind you would like to have. Sounds like the parts of any job or mentorship exercise that fall under "and other duties as needed."

[liv]

I was genuinely delighted (if a little surprised) to receive the flowers; I do not expect presents for using my liturgical knowledge for an obviously needed purpose like a memorial service, but it was a really nice gesture. The others, well, they were all well-intentioned, the blessed mother guy was projecting stuff onto me that I'm kind of uncomfortable with, but as you say, it does sometimes go with the role. But the rest is part of a fairly typical pattern of, if I stand up in front of a group and guide them in reading prayers I'm assumed to be an authority.

[silveradept]

Yeah, there is that sort of habit brought in by other practices.

The flowers were a nice gesture, though. The experience I'm used to is having the celebrant assistants getting a small payment for marriages and funerals, but the celebrants just doing it as their job.

[hatam_soferet]

I like the bit where people give you actual tokens of appreciation. You totally deserve that.