I thought that this topic was a very cut and dried one and no big deal for me. I was a christian without any ties to a particular religion but believed in God and now I am converting to Judaism and have to deal with the whole christmas issue. I will miss the trees because I enjoyed their beauty, they never really had a significant religious value to them for me so no biggie and I thought that was the end of it.
Our topic for this past conversion class was the December Dilema/Chanukah rolled into one. We learned the story of Chanukah. The Jews thought the king of Syria had died and then celebrated their freedom and much to their surprise he was alive and not pleased with their behavior so he desecrated the temple to show them who was the boss so to speak. After a three year war the Jews were victorious over the Syrians and then the rededication of the temple Chanukah was declared a holiday. You light candles to remind people on the outside of the miracle that happened.
Then we talked about interfaith families and how they might deal with Christmas/Chanukah. That is where I could really see how it would become a dilemma. For me it is not a problem but some in our class have children and the family is not converting just one person. A friend was saying that they had the menorah in the kitchen would light the candles and say the blessings and then when the candles burned out would go in the living room and open presents with the christian members of the family. That would be such a difficult slope to navigate to keep them both seperate and not muddy them into one catch all holiday.
We also talked about when people wish you a Merry Christmas. As a christian I always wished people in passing a happy holidays because you don't know by looking what faith if any they have. If I know you are christian I will wish you a Merry Christmas but otherwise I think I am going to stick with happy holidays but graciously accept Christmas wishes from strangers that don't know I am not a christian.
No comments:
Post a Comment