What I learned by going to church

Halachically, in accordance with Jewish law, a person of the Jewish faith should never go into a church or any house of worship that isn’t a synagogue because of the practice of what is called avodah zarah — defined as “strange worship” or “idolatry.”

As in most questions brought before the rabbis, there are differences of opinion about Jews going into a church, but among the Orthodox it is a given: an absolute NO!

As you might know, I am a chaplain, the only rabbi employed by Overlook Medical Center in Summit, and I’m a believer in being respectful and inclusive, rather than being seen as aloof, disrespectful, or exclusionary.

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During Hispanic Heritage Month, which ran from the middle of September till the middle of October last year, I was asked to do a reading during a Catholic mass. Father Eloy Romero-Rojas, a Roman Catholic priest who is one of our chaplains, texted me. “Would you please read from the book of Ecclesiastes, chapter 38, verses 1–15, in Spanish,” he asked. That text honors doctors and the work that they do; he sent me the text in Spanish.

“Ecclesiastes?” I replied. “What’s Ecclesiastes?”

A big smiley face popped up on my text from Eloy, and then, “sorry, rabbi, I meant Kohelet!”

The mass was completely in Spanish. It was very beautiful, and I wore my kipah as I read Chapter 38. When it ended, the smiles and the words of thanks were wonderful, but the respect that I garnered for being there and reciting from Kohelet was palpable.

At the end of the mass, Father Eloy came over to me. “Did it bother you that you were the only Jew there?” he asked.

I smiled. “There were two of us,” I said. “Me and the guy on the cross!”

He started to laugh, nodded, and said, “Yes, that’s right, rabbi.”

Halacha notwithstanding, there are many rabbis who have attended services in churches; Rabbi Haskel Lookstein, who is an Orthodox rabbi, went to an Episcopalian cathedral for the National Prayer Service on the day after President Barack Obama’s inauguration.

Rabbi Lookstein was chastised by the Rabbinical Council of America, who referred to the halachic prohibition, but he argued that many rabbis have attended services in churches all over the world. Chief rabbis of England have attended functions in Westminster Abbey. The chief rabbi of Haifa attended the funeral for Pope John Paul II, which included a full Mass. The list is endless.

A new tabernacle — the locked box where the Eucharist, the wafer that Catholics believe to be the body of Christ, is kept — was dedicated in the chapel at Overlook, by Bishop Manuel Aurelio Cruz of the Archdiocese of Newark.

I was standing next to the door during the mass, and when the bishop said “Peace be with you” and the congregants responded “And with you,” Bishop Cruz turned to me, put his hand to his heart, and said “Shalom.” I responded, with the same gesture, “Shalom.”

He chanted, and the congregants chanted along with him. I smiled at the words ‘Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of Hosts, the whole world is filled with his glory,’ because that is word for word the translation of Kedushah: Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh Adonai Tz’va’oat, m’lo kol ha’aretz kevodo.

I can’t imagine being in Rome and not visiting the Sistine Chapel or St. Peter’s Basilica, or in Paris without seeing the restored Notre Dame, or in New York without going to St. Patrick’s Cathedral, or missing Westminster Abbey in London, La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, the Duomo in Milan, or Hagia Sophia — or for that matter the Blue Mosque — in Istanbul.

Even though they are following a different path, people are worshipping the one God the way they were taught.

I will say this — if you believe that going into a church or a mosque has the slightest chance of making you convert, don’t go. But after one such visit, I feared that I would have to do a real check on my faith in my faith.

On Monday, January 17, 2005, I attended a funeral at the Second Baptist Church in Roselle. It was on the day that honored the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr., and the church was packed. The people weren’t there to memorialize MLK, but to pay last respects to Traci Yvette Clark. Traci died three days before her 41st birthday; she succumbed to an unbelievably aggressive, insidious form of cancer.

The funeral service was to begin at noon. I walked to the back of the church where eight or 10 people I knew, all white, were standing. How ironic, I thought, as a huge smile crossed my lips. It was Martin Luther King Day and all the white people here were standing, figuratively, at the back of the bus (in this case, the back of the church). Traci would’ve gotten the biggest kick out of it.

She had a smile that never quit. For the 15 years that I knew her, she never called me by my first name. “Mandel,” she’d say with as nasal a twang as she could, and it didn’t matter if we were in the office, at a bar, or a party, she’d bellow out: “Mandel, whatcha doin’, sugar?”

I figured the funeral service would be an hour, give or take, but I was very wrong. People spoke, some sang, there were readings from the Bible and from the New Testament. It was over an hour, and the eulogy hadn’t even started.

This was about to be culture shock for me.

I never heard the word A-men used so much in my life. As a matter of fact, the preacher used the word A-men more times in his 20- to 30-minute eulogy than we do during our entire Shabbat service. (We pronounce it “amen.”) Every time he said something that was important, he interjected “A-men.” “…and Jesus said — A-men, he knows the good — A-men, and he takes them to his bosom — A-men….”

The people in the congregation waved their arms, some stood, and many called out hallelujah or A-men.

The preacher held out his arms. “Traci has gone to Glory. A-men. Can I hear an A-men?” A-men, many people answered. “Yes sir, that beautiful rose now grows in another garden; the garden of The Lord.

“The garden of the Lord; can I hear an A-men? The Garden where it’s always sunny, A-men, where there is no more pain, A-men, no clouds, no snow or rain, y’all just bask in the glory: A-men.” A-mens rang out through the church, like a sonic jet breaking the sound barrier.

“You live by the railroad tracks, don’t you, Loretta?” The pastor spoke directly to Traci’s mom. “The train doesn’t stop behind your house, does it, Loretta? And Traci always heard those trains as well, didn’t she?

“But just the other day a train came by, a special train, and it didn’t stop either, but it slowed down. It slowed down enough for Traci to hear the folks on the train singing. And the words, the words were so clear: ‘People get ready there’s a train a coming…’”

The congregants sat rapt and you could hear them as the pastor stopped: “…You don’t need no baggage,” they whispered. “You just get on board.”

The pastor repeated, “A-men.” He said, “A-men A-men; You don’t need no baggage, you just get on board.”

“Traci didn’t need no baggage,” he said. “No, no. No ticket and no baggage, ’cause you don’t need no ticket, no, you don’t. You just thank the Lord.”

“All you need is faith,” they whispered again, and the pastor repeated: “All you need is faith to hear the diesels hummin’, you don’t need no ticket, you just thank the Lord.”

“A-men! Thank You Lord! Thank You Jesus!” people declared all around the church.

By now, I was standing at the back of the church, all alone, white and alone, goose pimples rising on my goose pimples as I listened to the pastor continue. Let me tell you, he put on one helluva show.

It was overwhelming. I was the only member of the tribe there that day, and I am, or before this funeral thought I was, entrenched in my Judaism, proud of what I am, of my heritage, and of my people.

Questions raced through my mind about whether or not being Jewish was what God really wanted me to be. Did he really send “his only son” down to earth to “wash my sins away”?

I was standing right next to the door, and when I saw the pallbearers walking the coffin out of the church, I beat them into the street.

I was outside, basking in the glory of the sun, and I looked up and thanked God for that sun. I always knew that Judaism was the only true path, but inside that church, the absolutely incredible way in which that preacher did what he does best, and he did it very well, I can’t even describe my disquiet.

It’s an interesting phenomenon, believing, having faith, and having your faith shaken and tested. Judaism has stood the test of time — almost six thousand years. My faith in my faith has stood for all the time that God has allowed me to spend on the earth and will stand for as long as I am here. I am completely secure in that.

Cantor/Rabbi Lenny Mandel, who left the wilds of Manhattan almost 50 years ago and lives in West Orange, has been the chazan at Congregation B’nai Israel in Emerson for the past quarter century.