A Tent Big Enough for All of Us

Just this past year South Dakota got its first full-time rabbi in over a generation. Mendel Alperowitz, an Orthodox rabbi, is going to serve a state where there are not only fewer than 1000 Jews, but where most of that small number are Reform Jews. What he says about that in his interview on NPR is instructive for many of us Christians:

Well, see, it's interesting because the way we look at it is every Jew is really a Jew. No Jew any less Jewish than Moses or Abraham, and we're excited to welcome all Jews. And rather than us putting up artificial barriers and division between people, we're just having an open home and ready to welcome everybody, like Abraham and Sarah welcomed everybody to their tents. We view everyone like Abraham and Sarah, and our doors will always be open.

To them all Jews are Jews, and they’re all welcome. Orthodox, Reform, Conservative, non-practicing. Those who keep kosher and those who don’t even know what it means, those who won’t carry their house keys on the Sabbath and those for whom Friday night and Saturday are merely part of “living for the weekend”, those who try to follow all 613 Levitical commandments and those for whom 613 is merely the number after 612. They all will be welcome in Rabbi Alperowitz’s tent. He sees himself as the rabbi to all the Jews in South Dakota.

So why can’t we be like this? Why do Christians have to be so divisive, and claim that you’re not a “real Christian” unless you believe and behave exactly like us?

Well, OK, let me clarify…we’re not all like that. It’s just “those people over there.” My people, the people on the more liberal part of the Christian spectrum do tend to maintain that Christianity is a big tent, with room enough for all. It’s those on the more conservative side who tend to look askance at us, and question whether or not we even belong in the same campground.

And this, despite the fact that in one of my favorite New Testament passages, Paul compares the body of Christ to an actual body…where every part is needed…eyes, ears, hands, feet, and heads. And to this I might add even the parts the we consider armpits and buttholes.

But what Rabbi Alperowitz says is even more instructive for us because is an Orthodox rabbi from the Lubavitcher movement. That’s perhaps the most conservative segment of Judaism. He’s saying that you’re a Jew whether or not you’re a Jew like us. Whether or not you believe and practice like us. Whether or not you’re super conservative or super liberal. You’re still one of us, you’re still family, and you’re welcome in our tent.

Why can’t more of us be like Rabbi Alperowitz? Why can’t all of us be like Rabbi Alperowitz? Why can’t we all say that it doesn’t matter where you stand on capital punishment, infant baptism, abortion, wine vs grape juice, gay rights, female clergy, marriage equality, dancing and playing cards (but not at the same time), divorce, and a host of other things; because there’s room in this tent for all of us? Why do we have to insist on our little group’s way being the standard, while everyone else is wrong and needs to be converted to our view before we accept them as part of the group?

Heck…why can’t we do that in the secular world as well?

Now, to be sure, my people aren’t totally without fault either. While we may grudgingly accept the fact that the more conservative Christians, who look down on us, are also Christians, there are just some who we think are too weird to count, those whose beliefs and practices are just too far from the mainstream for us to consider “real Christians”, even though they may consider themselves to be. And maybe it’s time for us to make room in the tent for them too.

So that we can be more like Rabbi Alperowitz.