• This is good. Oppression is not good for you, liberation is. So please don’t fear that by being ruled less “transgressive” those queer people who marry someone of their own gender will assimilate into invisibility. (Those who express this fear remind me of those Jews who are so afraid of assimilation that they yearn for the solidarity of the shtetl and other ghettos. Civil emancipation opened up space for our creativity, our religious expression and the gifts we contribute to civil society. We have the delightful problem of being entirely responsible for building a positive Judaism, a strong, supple, living tradition, a way of life that makes the most of being a person in this world.) This applies to queer people too. Our history of oppression can translate into a culture of solidarity. As my inspired friend “>reunion last week, “there will never be a future in which this did not happen.” Like Jews, queer people have stories and the lessons from those stories to shape a distinctive and full approach to being human. Such lessons as…
• We aren’t done. As another brilliant friend, the Coffee Shop Rabbi Ruth Adar “>Clementa Pinckney was buried today. Racism in employment, housing, voting rights and justice system practices is, unacceptably, alive and well. And let’s be clear: the category “Queer”, like the category “Jews” includes people of color, transfolk–who are still targeted for violence and systematic discrimination, and the economically dispossessed. None of us is free until all of us are free.
• Freedom isn’t license, it’s responsibility. Our Torah teaches that the Jews who were liberated from slavery ratified our freedom by accepting the covenant at Sinai. Only a free people can undertake the honor of obligation. (Yes, of course,“>speech at the Edmund Pettus Bridge and (astute politician that he is) understood that casting his lot with queer people helped him more than it hurt him in the last election. This is the result of years of hard work at educating, organizing, making art and making fabulous lives. Also, it’s worth remembering that the very first presidential candidate to mention gay folks positively in a national forum was Jesse Jackson at the 1984 Democratic convention who is, like our President, a Black man who manifestly likes being a Black man. Self-respect makes for solidarity.
• For my Jewish sisters and brothers who can’t find a halachic way to bless same-gender unions—you could still celebrate this victory for secular civil rights. We wouldn’t want kashrut to be the law of the land, would we? Our rights in this country depend on the understanding that no religion can claim civil hegemony or dictate the course of legislation. Justice Kennedy’s understanding of a living, evolving Constitution reminds me of exciting developments in Jewish law today. Any plodder can find new stringencies within law. To find a way for allowance to flourish within the embrace of legal structure—that’s the mark of a jurist!
Shabbat Shalom chevre.
Baruch atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech haolam, shehechehyanu, v'kiy'manu, v'higianu laz'man hazeh.
Our praise to You, Eternal our God, Sovereign of all: for giving us life, sustaining us, and enabling us to reach this season.
