Considerations in Christian-Jewish Understanding
May 2007
Religious Leaders Come Together As Colleagues in Dialogue
The Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding (CCJU) of Sacred Heart University sponsored its third annual Colleagues in Dialogue Conference on April 17 – 19, held at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. Colleagues in Dialogue is a flagship program that has grown out of the Center’s Institute for Rabbinical Students and Seminarians, whose mission is to foster deeper theological understanding, dialogue and collaboration among future Jewish and Christian religious leaders. The 2007 Colleagues in Dialogue Conference welcomed 31 rabbis, cantors, priests and ministers across the country. The featured speaker for the event was Mary C. Boys, Ph.D., author, scholar, educator and the Skinner and McAlpin Professor of Practical Theology at Union Theological Seminary, since 1994. The conference also included a Jewish scripture study of the Book of Ruth led by Rabbi Eugene Korn, Ph.D., associate executive director of the Center.
In his welcome address, David Coppola, Ph.D., an associate executive director at CCJU, described the conference as “dialogue at its best” for its affirmation that “strong diversity is what makes God’s presence known.” “This dialogue celebrates the theological identity of the other in an environment of openness, trust and mutual respect,” he said.
The opening session of the conference explored international developments in interreligious relations over the past year. CCJU director of programs and publications, Ann Morrow Heekin, Ph.D., led a discussion on global developments in Jewish-Christian relations, and the national and international work of CCJU.
A panel discussion about some local interreligious efforts experienced by the conference participants was led by Fr. Martin Burnham, St. Margaret Church, Maryland; Pastor Laura Crites, First United Church, Illinois; and Rabbi Jessica Zimmerman, Director of Congregational Engagement for Synagogue 3000 in New York City. Fr. Martin pointed to the addition of a Shoah education unit to the grade 8 curriculum in his parish school as one of his parish’s successful initiatives. Pastor Crites described her experiences with a book reading group as a way to draw adults into a more thorough understanding of Jewish history and tradition among her congregants. And Rabbi Zimmerman described a program in Phoenix, Arizona, “Sharing Sacred Space,” that began as an offer of hospitality from a Methodist to her synagogue after it was temporarily without a worship space in 1991. Today, the two congregations share ongoing programming. Rabbi Zimmerman said, “CCJU gave me an interest in this kind of dialogue by planting the seed of what open dialogue could look like.”
The following day, keynote speaker, Dr. Boys, opened her presentation with a reference to the statement, “A Sacred Obligation”, by the National Christian Scholars Group, and its call to interreligious dialogue as “an essential and undisputed obligation in our time.” Dr. Boys stated that while the foundation for Jewish-Christian understanding begins in the theological understanding of the other, it must also embrace the dimensions of spirituality and education for dialogue. “Jews and Christians come to dialogue with very different agendas and we must acknowledge that supersessionism has a long shelf life.” (Dr. Boys referred to the belief that Christianity had replaced Judaism; a teaching that was corrected in 1965 with the Vatican II document, Nostra Aetate). “The call for both Jews and Christians today,” she said quoting Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, “is to see ourselves as partners in the covenants of redemption.”
Dr. Boys said the challenge of dialogue is to move beyond tolerance and to broaden and deepen one’s knowledge of others’ beliefs and practices. “Dialogue becomes a refractive lens where we gain another angle of vision by seeing our tradition through another’s eyes,” she said. Further, “Dialogue contributes to a humility that helps us to embrace our limitations and our errors [and helps us to know the other] so that differences can be held but not dissolved.” Educating for dialogue, she concluded, is “the holy work of welcoming the stranger and becoming the stranger.”
The presentation by Rabbi Korn, “Caritas and Commandment: A Jewish Reading of the Book of Ruth,” was an opportunity to understand how Jews understand God and their religious life. “Ruth symbolizes hesed, a term which denotes ‘excess’, especially referring to extraordinary loving-kindness,” Rabbi Korn said quoting from the medieval Jewish philosopher, Moses Maimonides. The text dramatizes that Ruth did “the irrational thing” when she chose to “cling” to her mother-in-law, Naomi, and return with her to Bethlehem. According to the logic of self-interest, explained Rabbi Korn, Ruth the Moabite, had no obligation to remain loyal to Naomi the Jew, and yet her hesed, her capacity for extraordinary kindness, led her to act beyond the strict requirements of the demands of reason. Ruth’s loving-kindness not only transforms her but overflows as blessing to Naomi and her family, as well. Where the Christian-Jewish traditions meet in the Book of Ruth, suggested Rabbi Korn, is the Gospel of Mathew and its teaching that the commandment to love God is necessarily linked to love of neighbor as God loves us. “In both traditions,” said Rabbi Korn, “we find law and hesed to be integral components of our faithfulness to God”.
The conference concluded with a walking tour of Jewish-Christian history in lower Manhattan, dinner at a kosher restaurant, and a Broadway show.
Reflecting on the experience of “Colleagues in Dialogue”, Pastor Robert Kersten of the United Methodist Church in Delhi, New York, said, “We need the disequilibrium of dialogue that is rebalanced by audacious hesed.”
The 2007 “Colleagues in Dialogue” participants included Rabbi Alan Abrams, Rabbi Bryan Bramly, Pastor Margaret Cook, Pastor Bob Janis-Dillon, Fr. Tim Ekaitis, Rabbi Eliana Falk, Rabbi William Friedman, Rabbi Dorothy Goldberg, Rabbi Sharon Grainer, Rabbi Terry Greenstein, Pastor Jennifer Hanus Guelmami, Pastor Tomi Jacobs, Rabbi Larry Moldo, Fr. Dan Moll, Rabbi Laurence Rosenthal, Rabbi Jeremy Schneider, Rabbi Kerith Spencer-Shapiro, Fr. Walter Stumpf, Fr. Rich Warsnak, Pastor Stoney Weiszman, Miho Yasukawa, Rabbi Yvonne Youngberg, and Rabbi Susan Zengerle.
Upcoming CCJU Events
Annual Seminarians and Rabbinical Students Conference May 29 – 31, Sacred Heart University
U.S. Bishops Study Tour to Auschwitz and Rome September 2 – 7, Poland and Rome
Wrestling With Problem Passages Conference October 15 – 16, Los Angeles, CA
CCJU Staff
Rabbi Joseph H. Ehrenkranz, Executive Director
Rabbi Eugene Korn, Ph.D., Associate Executive Director
David L. Coppola, Ph.D., Associate Executive Director
Ann Morrow Heekin, Ph.D., Director of Programs and Publications
Guillaine Dale, Assistant to the Directors
Joan Jackson, Office Secretary
Monthly newsletter of the Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding
The Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding of Sacred Heart University seeks to contribute to the creation of a world of greater respect, cooperation and peace by educating Christians and Jews for a dialogue that is based on knowledge and truth about God and one another. The Center promotes scholarship, trains future religious leaders, educates teachers and leaders of parishes and synagogues, and serves as a leader in promoting Christian-Jewish understanding in the United States and throughout the world |
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