a joyous event

On Saturday morning, we journeyed to Somerville for a baby naming service. This particular baby was born to a co-worker and his wife on the 75th anniversary of my own mother's birth. Given that many gatherings I've been to recently have marked sadder occasions at the other end of life, it was a real boost to be a part of this happy event.

We were invited to attend all or part of the festivities. In my mind, there was a quick Torah service at 9:15, followed by the baby naming at 10, perhaps in a function room, and then brunch at the house of the new parents around 10:30 or 10:45. Wrong, wrong, and wrong.

You see, when I grew up and for the short time I went to temple, it was like going to a modern Christian church (except, of course, that some of the service was in Hebrew and we didn't talk about that J-guy and the Bible readings weren't from a book but from a scroll).

But the structure was similar. A dude in a black graduation robe stood up front, facing the audience. We sat in theater-style flip-up chairs with arm rests. We showed up on time and pretty much sat still for the entire service. We had a hymnal. Most of the service was in English. There was a great deal of ritual, readings, commentary in the form of a sermon, and we were in and out and done in 45 minutes or an hour. Good to go for another week.

Fast-forward to this weekend. The temple was oldish (dating from 1922) and elegant. The service had started when we arrived but someone urged us to go in anyways (won't we be interrupting? no problem, just go in). Apparently, there's a beautiful worship hall upstairs, but we were in the auditorium on folding chairs (it's a smaller room and much more intimate. Oh, and the portable ark (where the Torah is kept) was stunningly beautiful -- lots of Tiger maple).

A woman came up to us as we entered and greeted us, told us what was going on, invited us to take books and to sit down. (Right in the middle of the service!! Talking!!!)

The head dude guy (and he was a dude -- looked like he'd just gotten off his Harley. He wasn't wearing a yalmukah, he was wearing a do-rag, and jeans, sandals-with-socks, and a white shirt under his prayer shawl) was standing at a lectern in the middle of the congregation, facing the same direction as everyone else.

The service was almost completely in Hebrew with an occasional announcement of the page we were on. Each pair of facing pages in the prayer book had Hebrew on the right and English translation on the left. It was helpful to read along quietly as the service progressed.

It turned out that we did not arrive just at the end of the service as I'd planned, but just at the beginning during the quiet meditative prayer part. Some of the prayers in fact, were just barely read aloud, almost in a mumble, some in a clear strong voice.

I was struck at the spiral structure of the service, too. In the beginning, there were many prayers about our relationship to the outside world -- mostly about kindness and peace, and specifically about kindness to our neighbors and at home, with perhaps a focus on presence and awareness. From there, we moved into more of a presence in the worship, itself, spiralling ever closer to the reading of the Torah.

Oh, and I should mention that part of presence for me is not-presence. At some point, my mind wandered and I realized that Robert and I were the only people we knew in the room. A little panic set in -- had we gone to the wrong temple -- were there six more down at the other end of the street? How rude would it be to get up and go check? But eventually, others we knew wandered in, so we stayed.

All throughout, people were coming and going. Kids were racing around, sometimes in the hall outside, sometimes coming in and hanging out with their folks before heading out again. People left partway through the service. Or they came late and left early.

In fact, the assistant head-dude arrived (again in jeans, sandals, and wearing a baseball cap) part-way through the service, almost on his cue, and left before the service was done.

But anyways, the parents and their tiny baby finally arrived. And eventually, we got to the Torah portion of the service. Now, in my growing-up temple, this was a very brief part of the service, about as long as a Bible reading in a regular Christian service. But on Saturday, the Torah section went on for a while, and there was a Haftorah reading afterwards for Hanukah. The story was a really good one, and they had handed out annotated Bibles beforehand so that we could follow along. The English translation was marvelous and you could get lost in the footnotes.

Between sections, they'd pause and new people would say the closing and opening prayers for reading the Torah. At one point, someone called out "Anyone else? Two Torahs, no waiting."

And, it turned out that there were dudettes involved, too. As I mentioned, when I was growing up, rabbis were always male. We heard that female rabbis had just been accepted, and I've since met a few, but I've never seen one in action, and specifically, I'd never before seen a woman read from the Torah except at a Bat Mitzvah. But at this service, women were as welcome to read from the Torah as were men. Wow. Powerful stuff.

The sermon was in English and brought together themes from the Dao and of peace, tying the story in the Torah and the story of Hanukah neatly into modern day concerns. It was brief and articulate and coherent.

Oh, and somewhere in there, the baby was named. The parents were incredibly happy and proud. I think the grandparents were falling over themselves with joy. The father was given the honor of saying one of the closing and opening Torah prayers (though in this temple, I expect the mother could have said the prayers too).

And about three hours after we arrived, the service was over. I will admit that the last half hour was a little hard. But I was taken by the loving-kindness and real inclusiveness I felt in that hall. Another friend was present. He was brought up here, but served in the Israeli army (so he understood every single word spoken at the service, unlike me). And he's completely secular. His response was "If I was at all religious, I'd want to come to this temple." I had the exact same reaction, as did Robert, my beloved goy.

Of course, this being a Jewish ceremony, good eating followed. We had some noshes at the temple, including perhaps the best challah I've ever tried and some great out-of-season, but nonetheless delicious hamentashen. And then we went off to the parents' house for our long-awaited brunch and ate, talked, and celebrated there.

For some reason, by the time we got home, I was exhausted, so I took a long nap, and we bagged on our evening plans. A good day, and a great start for Lilia Katherine. Welcome, little girl!