It’s Also Hard to be a Jew Who Celebrates Christmas, on Christmas
by Rabbi Nikki Deblosi PhD
When it comes to being Jewish at Christmastime, our minds immediately tune into the hardship of being in the minority. Though the United States claims to be a secular nation, there are so many ways in which a certain version of Protestant Christianity has been and continues to be the unremarked-upon, so-pervasive-it’s-nearly-invisible model against which all other traditions are measured. From always having Christmas off from school, to always having to ask your professor for an “excused” absence on Yom Kippur, to constantly having to correct folks that Hanukkah is not “the Jewish Christmas,” it can be plain exhausting to navigate the “Holiday Season” as a Jew, of any denomination.
Add to the mix the fact that most non-Orthodox Jews in the United States come from interfaith backgrounds. According to some studies, more than 50 percent of intermarried households raise their children with some Jewish education and observance (a major increase from previous studies conducted in the 1990s). Jewish articles around this time of year often focus on the challenges parents face in getting their children excited about dreidels and latkes in the face of the overwhelming, commercialized cultural monolith that is Christmas. But what about our students? What about the parents, mentors, and teachers of emerging adults? How do we experience the December Dilemma?
frosty the snowman is secular, they say
It turns out, we face discrimination from (at least) two directions. Perhaps the more expected discrimination comes from non-Jews; though, unlike facing the ignorance of non-Jewish outside our own families, as most Jewish folks experience at this time of year, those of us from interfaith families of origin face the additional discomfort of knowing that this ignorance and discrimination comes from our own aunts, cousins, siblings, in-laws, even parents and grandparents. This type of discrimination from non-Jewish family, friends, communities, and cultures sees our celebration of Hanukkah and other Jewish observances and customs as an unwelcome intrusion, an attempt to “force” our religious beliefs on an otherwise perceived-as-secular holiday, a detraction from the “main” family celebration of Christmas, or a cute sideshow at best.
As Jews in a majority-Christian culture, perhaps like those in the early rabbinic period who proudly displayed their hannukiyot (Hanukkah menorahs) in the window so that passers-by would see and know the miracle of the oil that lasted eight days, we have to make an extra effort to celebrate as Jews. As one parent attested, “Christmas is everywhere, but I have to create an environment where Jewish holidays are noticeable to my kids.”
There is little understanding of how to integrate and celebrate difference without tokenizing or erasing difference. For example, so-called holiday concerts consider non-religious Christmas songs to be “neutral,” while Jewish (or other religiously or culturally specific) songs are rejected as religious (and therefore inappropriate for a public school, for example) or too alienating and “hard to learn.” So, Hanerot Halalu is rejected, “brushed off as being ‘too difficult,’” one student remarks, while that same Jewish student was “expected to memorize two movements from Handel’s Messiah!”
“you’re ruining christmas!”
Then there’s the disappointment or even anger that our non-Jewish family members can display to us. From “why do we have to celebrate your holiday” to “just be a good grandchild and come to church with us!”, we are often asked to highlight one part of ourselves to the detriment of another, or to deny our Jewishness so that we can more neatly fit into the extended family’s idea of who “we” are supposed to be. As one student put it, “if the two holidays overlap (by which I mean Christmas and Hanukkah), it always feels as if we can’t be TOO enthusiastic about [Hanukkah] because it ‘overshadows’ the ‘real’ holiday we’re supposed to be celebrating.”
Many students have come to me in tears, struggling to find a way to honor their family’s expectations of them without having to attend mass or other Christian religious rituals over Christmas.
For the most part, these are students who were raised in interfaith families or who have extended family members who practice a religion other than Judaism, but who themselves identify primarily as Jewish. Stepping into a church for these students is fraught, often laden with associations of both exclusion and belonging. Rarely do students feel empowered to ask their family to reciprocate by attending services at a synagogue or having a family hanukkiyah lighting; students who have made such invitations often report that their families react with bewilderment, not believing the two invitations to be equal.
My own decision to stop bringing my sons to Catholic mass (at which my mother used to sing in the choir) and to refuse to perpetuate the myth of Santa Claus to them (sorry, those who still hang on to that belief… and I also have some bad news about the Tooth Fairy) caused much pain and anguish among my siblings and nieces and nephews. It can be hard for our Christian family members to see their annual Christmas celebrations as a violation of our Jewish identities, or as problematic for anyone who identifies as interfaith.
Of course we can all benefit from sharing our traditions. I recall one beautiful (and unseasonably warm) Christmas Eve at my mother’s home, when I found myself on the porch with my then-toddler, my niece, and my two sisters, dancing the horah and singing Hebrew songs. Pine boughs adorned the ballisters and lights adorned the door, behind which a traditional Italian fish dinner (we didn’t have all seven) bubbled on the stove. It was pretty magical.
we’re pluralist jews… just not on christmas
Finally, there’s the fact that many Jewish institutions, understandably attempting to find time for long-term, high-impact experiences like conferences, alternative breaks, and trainings, see Christmas as a neutral day around which to plan their calendars. Admittedly, it is extremely challenging to navigate a so-called secular calendar, on which academic calendars like NYU’s are based, and our Jewish calendar, to find times when working professionals and students can come together for meaningful programming and community-building. And for many of us Jewish professionals, the thought that we might have to further capitulate to a Christian calendar can be downright maddening.
But as the number of Jewishly-educated and Jewishly-identified folks raised in interfaith families increases, where does that leave Jews who have family obligations to fulfill on December 25th? It definitely does not leave us free to attend things like regional Jewish youth movement conventions, Jewish songleading institutes, and other annual events that take place during that “free” week.
Not every Jewish institution needs to rethink its annual events calendar as a result, but we should stop claiming to be completely “pluralist” and “inclusive”, especially when our institutions often make no comment on the fact that their timing categorically excludes Jews in interfaith families with holiday obligations.
you’re not really jewish
Christmas was a big deal in my house growing up. Reminiscing about those celebrations in any positive way in a Jewish setting — especially a professional setting — feels extremely risky to me. Even sharing my wife and I’s current custom of giving our children a gift on each of the eight nights of Hanukkah has more than once brought the very unwelcome comment that I am indulging in a “Christian custom.”
In fact, the overwhelming response I received when I asked members of the Bronfman Center community how we experience the December dilemma was this: Other Jews reject us, criticize us, and make us feel less than. From eye rolling, to language about who is “more” or “less” religious, students in our community report feeling like they have to defend their Jewishness if their personal practice includes participating in any way in their family’s Christmas celebrations. Interestingly, this criticism also comes from Jews who have the custom of visiting their Christian neighbors for dinner, carols, and even tree decorating.
can’t we all just get along
And all of this is completely understandable: it is hard to be a Jew on Christmas. I never really understood it until I converted. Now I do, at least in part, define my Jewish identity as the absence of common “secular” American “holiday” markers (like a Christmas tree — we don’t have one in our home. We can look at Nana’s when we visit her). But when Jewish folks turn against other Jewish folks in judgment about the presence of non-Jewish family members and celebrations in our lives, it really hurts. As one student put it, “I experienced friends and community members making their Jewish identity about what they didn’t do. It felt like if you did do anything related to Christmas, you weren’t as Jewish as them.”
My friend and colleague, Rabbi Jillian Cameron, was ordained by her Hebrew name, which includes both her father’s Hebrew name and her mother’s decidedly non-Hebrew name, transliterated. She writes, “I like pine tree scented candles and the song Silver Bells, and Santa (a.k.a. my mom, but please don’t tell her I know) has given me a stocking every year I’ve been alive even when I lived in Jerusalem, AND I’m still Jewish, happily, proudly, knowledgeably, deeply, and even writing all those adjectives feels unnecessarily apologetic.”
The Talmud teaches that when a person chooses to live a Jewish life, we do not chastise them for their extended family’s practices. And, yes, I know it gets stickier (especially because different denominations view intermarriage very differently) when we’re talking about folks who are Jewish and practice traditions from more than one religion or culture. But ultimately, I am thinking this year (and every year in Kislev and December) about the students who come to me in tears, in anger, in confusion, looking for support from their families and finding misunderstanding, and looking for support from their Jewish community and finding judgment. I want to answer their dilemma with acceptance.
Rabbi Nikki Deblosi PhD is the Assistant Director of Jewish Education and Engagement at the NYU Bronfman Center.
