winterbadger | as pointed out by percyprune, FCD

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Peter, a pair for each of your children perhaps?

I think surely some for my fathers-side cousin in TX (the one who greeted my mother's news that I was converting to Judaism with "Oh, no, surely you're going to stop him? It would be so awful if he were to burn in Hell for all eternity!")

Current Mood: amused

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From:

silme.livejournal.com

Ew... Yuck!

Oh, and I guess that lady didn't know that Jews don't believe in Hell? ;)

I hadn't realised you were a convert. I took all the conversion classes (have Judaism in the family, but it's way back there, so I took the classes) myself! :)

From:

winterbadger

Oh, and I guess that lady didn't know that Jews don't believe in Hell? ;)

I don't think it even crossed her mind. :-)

I hadn't realised you were a convert.

Yep. Went to Torah study for a year or so beforehand, then did the classes (Chris did too, for solidarity's sake, as well as curiosity), had counselling sessions with the senior rabbi (fat lot of good that was--I was his last subject, and he wasn't really interested) and completed the ceremony. Served as an usher for HHD services once or twice and did some other volunteer stuff. I even did the adult bar mitzvah class and stood up on my hind feet and read Torah (a short passage, VERY badly).

Eventually congregational politics over Israel, the Palestinians, and the Second Intifada got too heated and I left the congregation. I had joined because I was really gripped by Judaism's ethical structure and its emphasis on justice and mercy and making this world a better place (rather than worrying about some notional and possibly illusory next world). But a lot of that seemed to go out the window for many of my fellow congregants when it came to the reality of present-day events. "Justice and mercy--except if we've got something at stake, in which case screw justice an mercy and every race for themselves." There were quite a few of us who felt differently, but as a convert I felt more and more uncomfortable about being the one speaking up in discussions. My friend Dan felt the same way, a nd one of the other more outspoken peaceniks was our new senior rabbi, a very accompished and impressive woman of about my age, whose position made it difficult, I think, to put her feelings as strongly as she might have preferred.

So I left. And given that that is about the most liberal congregation in the area, there didn't seem much point in looking around for another one. I'm not really observant in any sense any more. I'm feeling less and less inclined towards religion of any sort and feel that doing what seems right to me and encouraging others to do the same is about as far as things go for me.

From:

plutosonium.livejournal.com

Completely unrelated, but I wanted to tell you that I saw a bumpersticker today which proudly announced "I poke badgers with spoons."

From:

winterbadger

:-) That's rather amusing!

From:

winterbadger

In turn I'll relate that, having joined all sorts of UK outdoors organizations, it occured to me that I'd been neglecting ones right here, so I joined the PATC the other day and checked about 2/3 of the boxes for "would you volunteer for..." :-)