Many of the Jewish immigrants who came to America around the turn of the century had had negative experiences of Christianity in their countries of origin. For those fleeing forced conversions and pogroms, the sign of the cross was a harbinger of dislocation, pain and suffering. Christian missionaries were often startled by the degree of hostility these people exhibited to their advances. But they quickly learned how to get better traction when they understood a few important things about the folks they were trying to “save.†They understood that Jews, especially immigrant Jews, took great comfort in the embrace of their community, their language, and the rituals and symbols that were familiar to them in a strange, new world. And they understood that the very concept of “conversion†carried so much baggage that any reference to it was a total non-starter.
The solution was simple. Bring Jews to Christianity in a different way. Use Jewish texts, Jewish symbols and Jewish language and, most important, promote the maintenance of Jewish community. The "Jewish Christian,†it was now asserted, did not have to “convert†(because Christianity was actually a “Jewish religionâ€) and did not have to go to a “church†to pray. Thus, the first “Hebrew Christian†congregations were born.
Well, despite the assimilation and integration of the Jewish community into American society, its reaction to missionary efforts hasn’t changed much in the past century. In his essay, America’s Bishops: No Jews Invited , Dr. Zmirak reveals that he grasps this concept all too well.Centuries of coercive attempts to convert the Jews and dissolve them into the mass of Gentile Christendom should teach us to tread very lightly here. Whatever their motives, Christians from the early Middle Ages on demanded of Jews who converted absolute assimilation, and began to treat “backsliding†as a form of heresy. The most infamous examples of this occurred during the Inquisition in Spain — which popes of the day condemned but were unable to control.
Dr. Zmirak asserts that the Catholic bishops, unable to resolve what they wrongly perceive as contradictions within Church doctrine, are “writing off Jews as outside the Christian mission—radioactive, perhaps, too hot to touch, in the wake of the Holocaust.†But Dr. Zmirak has a "better" way, a solution to this fabricated dilemma that is “offered by—no surprise—a group of Jewish converts to Catholicism, who seek to keep their identity as Jews, the Association of Jewish Catholics."
There are many such organizations in existence today, but this Association appears to be rather unique in one respect. Its goal is not to integrate Jews into the Catholic community but, rather, to create a special environment within which "Catholics of Jewish descent" can flourish. The “Hebrew Christian Fellowship ,†on the other hand, pursues a more traditional missionary approach: “to lovingly and sensitively present the Gospel of Messiah Jesus to Jewish people.†They’re determined to right the wrongs of the past and respect the feelings of those they seek to persuade. But the Jewish people haven’t suffered torture, ridicule, dispossession and death for 2,000 years rather than convert to Christianity because we weren’t asked nicely or offered our own space. We've refused to convert because the basic premise of Christianity is inimical to our most deeply held beliefs. And no matter how loving and sensitive the invitation, the answer is still no.
With some trepidation, I’m going to return very briefly to the analogy of Islam. What if Islamic preachers started to suggest that there should be communities of Catholic Muslims? Perhaps it’s all the Arabic trappings of Islam that are discouraging American Catholics from embracing the true faith. Perhaps these Catholics could cling to the Koran while maintaining their own traditions and customs within the protection of the Umma. Perhaps they could acknowledge Mohammed as the Prophet of God and denounce the divinity of Jesus but somehow stay “Catholic†because…, what? They would carry a rosary? Eat fish on Friday? Pray in Latin instead of Arabic? In what way would a Catholic Muslim remain a Catholic? In no way at all.
What we are being offered here is, essentially, a lobotomy. We may, for a time, continue to walk and talk like Jews, to dress and eat like Jews, if we wish. But the essential underlying premise of our existence and survival, our higher nerve center, the concept that has kept us who we are through the millennia must be discarded. The quintessential declaration of our faith, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One†is simply an outmoded expression of the “true†faith we were always destined to accept – that the Lord is Three.
Can Dr. Zmirak possibly be unaware that this proposal of his is over 2,000 years old? That the very first Christians tried to sell the very same story to the Jewish community of Judea in the first century of the common era? I don’t think so. And it’s this hubris, this dishonesty, this disingenuous pretense at ignorance of history that prompted me to jump back into this debate, as distasteful as I find it. It's distasteful because each of the world's great religions has contributed (and can continue to contribute) so much wealth to our civilization, and yet we continue to (ab)use them as crude weapons to fight old, old battles of power, turf and supremacy. After all this time, we’re still playing “my god’s bigger than your god.†Well, some of us still are.
Two thousand years ago, for various reasons, the Jews turned inward, away from conquest, and adopted a defensive posture. Christianity did not, and proceeded to conquer most of the known world. But here’s an interesting little irony with which I’d like to head toward concluding. It was Christianity’s rejection “at home†that ultimately pushed it out of its birthplace. Had the early Christians succeeded in winning over their Jewish compatriots, there might never have been a viable mission to the Gentiles. The Jewish component in the early Church who insisted on conversion to Judaism as a prerequisite to salvation would likely have prevailed, in which case the “New Judaism†would probably have remained the religion of a small, subjugated, circumcised people living in a corner of the Middle East. Who knows what the path of their migration would have been under those circumstances or whether they would not simply have been wiped out by the unconverted pagans of Rome or some other empire?
So, are we done yet? Almost. One of the frustrations that Jews have had to deal with through centuries of rehashing this same argument is that our most basic point is always ignored: Please just leave us alone. Don't tell us what we need. Don't tell us what we want. Don't try to tell us what our Bible really says. Go about your business, in peace, and leave our relationship with God to us. Instead, all kinds of other easily refutable accusations and insinuations are read into our responses that we didn't mean and didn't make. And then (surprise!) they are refuted. Well, this instance has been no exception. But I'm done. On to other things.
