Conversion To Orthodox Judaism

Luke Ford says:

7 p.m. So many great sessions. I guess I should be in Rabbi Jonathan Aaron’s “Gossip is Called ‘Evil Tongue’ For A Reason” but instead choose Catalina Ballroom 2 for Rabbi Michael Melchior’s lecture on conversion to Judaism in the 21st Century.

I sit in the second row. The room fills up. Maybe this Michael Melchior bloke is the superstar of LimmudLA 2010?

When he walks in, he’s a worry. He’s heavily stooped. His face is ashen. He says he’s been traveling for 29 hours straight to get here from Israel. He doesn’t look like he has the strength to climb to the platform let alone give a speech.

But once he gets rolling, he gets rolling. I’m mesmerized. He’s hilarious and wise and fair. I’d follow this guy anywhere. He’s my new hero.

Oy, but that stoop. Look at how tips his head back and compresses his neck. So much unnecessary tension there. His shoulders curve inward. His spine must be all mashed together. I could really help him with some Alexander Technique. Poor man. He’ll have doctors and healers fussing over him all weekend. He’s not going to listen to me. But I can help him more than anybody! And he can help me, he can be my new father figure. I’ll confess to him my sins and he’ll absolve me. He seems like an understanding bloke.

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Social Climbing LimmudLA 2010

Luke Ford says:

I imagine my tombstone: “Here lies Luke Ford. He’s dead. He choked on his peanut butter before what would have been his biggest weekend of the year. I guess he’s no longer the future of journalism.”

I feel jittery. I wonder if it’s the coffee. I need to be revved up, but not jittery.

I sit on the sofa opposite the entrance and hope my friends come soon. I just can’t make it any other way. I’ve seen fire and I’ve seen rain. I’ve seen lonely times when I could not find a friend. But I always thought I’d see you again.

At least I’m not sick. My throat isn’t sore. I don’t have the sniffles. My HIV is under control. Thank God for the cocktail! AIDS is no longer a death sentence.

Jeff emails: “Were you kidding about HIV?”

Yes.

Jeff replies: “You might want to clarify that because it doesn’t come off that way.”

I have a family who loves me. I have a good therapist. I have more than a year of Alexander Technique teacher training under my belt. I no longer interview porn stars for a living.

I’m respectable now. I have my Orthodox conversion. I have my shuls. Nobody’s trying to ban me.

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Lost In A Vortex Of Lust

Luke Ford says:

When I was growing up in Seventh-Day Adventist Christianity, the sin of fornication aka pre-marital sex received more attention than any other sin. It was the biggie. To do it, was to deny Christ and his love.

I’ve never heard a sermon in an Orthodox shul condemning pre-marital sex. I don’t think I’ve even heard it condemned from the bima (pulpit). The Orthodox rabbis I know take it for granted. Not that they say it is OK, but they give it no more attention than masturbation.

By contrast, there are all these talks about homosexuality in Orthodox Judaism.

I wonder why pre-marital sex gets no love? All sex outside of monogamous heterosexual marriage is condemned by Judaism according to the normative Orthodox view.

Why aren’t rabbis thundering against masturbation? Why aren’t they warning their unmarried congregants that they are placing their soul in peril by engaging in French kissing, let alone fondling, petting, heavy petting, heavy petting underneath clothing, oral sex and the like. Why this wall of rabbinical silence on this vitally important Jewish issue?

God, I am getting so worked up just thinking about the hazards of these sins. I guess it is up to the Leader to set the Jews straight.

I remember hanging out at the Pacific Union College pool in the late 1977, I was 11 at the time, and I was shocked to hear the lifeguards talk about going to see the movie Saturday Night Fever. I was shocked to hear about their participation in disco dancing. Both movie-going and dancing are big sins in Adventism.

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Christian Compassion Vs. Jewish Compassion

Luke Ford says:

A Christian woman says while I am in the room: "I was nine years old when WWII ended. We lived in France. We knew about the concentration camps. We knew someone who survived the concentration camps. And even then, I felt sorrier for the people running the camps than the people in them. Because the people running the camps were deeper in hell. Didn't Christ say that he didn't come for the good people but for the bad?"

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I Said Yes To HaShem

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Stress Kills

Donna Burstyn says:

I want to share with you some of the incredible people who have been a part of my life. I want to tell you about the heroes and heroines who under the worst of circumstances pulled themselves up. Some not all the way up. And some graduated this chapter of psycho-therapy.

I won’t reveal anybody’s identity. I will only share the gratitude I feel for having known these heroes and heroines.

We often think our dramas are unique to us, but we’re all the same.

During my 18 years of practicing psycho-therapy, I’ve seen miracles.

I’ve also seen people who’ve chosen to stay impoverished in their thinking and behavior.

One woman comes to mind. I’ll call her Barbara.

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Taking Children From Fathers

Donna Burstyn says:

I’m getting sick and tired of laws and divorce courts that take children away from their fathers.

I’m not happy that many children are raised with fathers two days a week, if they’re lucky!

I don’t know much about divorce court. I don’t know how to file what document where. That’s not my area of expertise.

I see so many men come to my office frustrated and alienated and angry and disappointed that courts have chosen against a 50/50 split for a 70/30 split or weekends only.

I don’t think this is usually in the best interests of the child.

I was a single mother for many years. I raised four kids. They’re now all adults. And I know how many adults feel such keen pain having had an absent father.

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