“My father had his own special chair that nobody else was allowed to sit in. We were taught that he was holy and spoke for God. During a blessing he might kiss me on top of the head, and that was like wow. But there were no ‘I love yous’ in our home. On Friday nights we’d go to his synagogue, and my favorite part of the service was a song called Lecha Dodi. It means ‘Come My Beloved,’ and it’s a love song to God. My life was so devoid of affection, that song was like water in the desert for me. I was raised to be the wife of a rabbi. Nobody checked my homework, or cared about my grades. When I told my mother I wanted to go to college, she threatened to call the psychiatrist. That was the beginning of my rebellion. I left home and started working as a cleaning lady. I had no community, nothing. I’d only ever known a world where God is male, and our leaders are male. I was so vulnerable. I ended up getting raped. There was a lot of trauma. And at the same time I was dealing with this great sense of spiritual loss. It was actually in a support group for ex-orthodox where I learned about Romemu. My friend said: ‘I know everything Jewish is toxic, but give this synagogue a try.’ The service was held in a former church. And the first thing the Rabbi said was: ‘We welcome every one of every faith, or no faith.’ His name was David. He was a wounded healer. He’d also grown up Orthodox. He’d been abused as a child. ‘Some of us have been traumatized by God,’ he said. And I needed to hear that. Because in that moment I felt so broken. Most adults get to be evolved versions of their childhood self. But my childhood was a severed path, a foreign country. Nobody from there wanted to talk to me. Everything that once seemed holy, now seemed cruel. But David provided an access point to God that wasn’t toxic. He taught the same texts, and same parables. But his interpretations were different. More tolerant. More progressive. During that first service we sang ‘Lecha Dodi.’ I closed my eyes. And I had this vision of myself as a child, singing in my father’s synagogue. It’s almost like the two of us were singing together. We finally had permission to exist at the same time.”
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