I want to state (as a disclaimer to any lookers on) that, though I call my boyfriend "The Crazy Israeli," it is a nickname only in the sense of good humor and of protecting his anonymity. There are readers who will know his name, but in giving him a nickname on this public forum, I am protecting his right to privacy. It also needs to be stated that there is nothing derogatory about the name to me and I would hope my readers would understand my brand of humor with regards to this nickname. I would be a hypocrite to call him crazy when I'm as much of a nutter as I am. Rather, "The Crazy Israeli" refers both to our relationship being so ridiculous and illogical that it's crazy, as well as to impart the sense that we are divinely "meant to be" because you'd have to be a little bit nutty to want to put up with me for any length of time. But in the fairness of disclaimers, Boyfriend is Israeli in his blood and a Midwesterner by life experience the same way that I am Southern in my blood but a Pacific Northwesterner by life experience. We are products of our heritage without being completely OF that culture.And he's no more crazy than I am.
It seems as though, in order to properly write this post, I am going to have to cover the last six months of my life, including addressing how things ultimately broke down between me and The Crazy Israeli only to get completely rebuilt.
On the morning of March 23, 2010, Rabbi Bryan Bramly was arrested at gunpoint in the Temple Beth Sholom parking lot, accused of sexually assaulting a now-17 year old girl over 10 years ago at a slumber party. Having studied predators in college with serious focus (as I was sexually assaulted as a child), I immediately drew the only logical conclusion - that he was innocent. The accusation stood that, in essence, Rabbi Bramly had snuck into where ever this girl was sleeping and just outright sexually assaulted her with his daughter sleeping nearby. And yet, I couldn't help but looking at what we know to be true of sexual predators: that they usually start with their own children (it's seen as "safer"), they go on to "groom" other children into submission for a full act (usually starting with kind words and "sit on my lap" and progressing to molestation before they rape), and they cannot ever just stop at ONE child. Knowing he had never assaulted his own children, that the accusation said he just snuck in and raped her, and that there was just this ONE girl claiming this, even AFTER headlines ran across the nation with this wild accusation, I was dumbfounded as to how anyone could even THINK this was more than a troubled young girl desperately seeking attention.
Over the course of the next 6 months, we had a town hall meeting with Rabbi Bramly's legal defense team, informing us that, "The Grand Jury would indict a ham sandwich if they could." Many of us had informal conversations with Rabbi Bramly where we continued our individual Rabbi-Congregation relationships with the man who was seen as OUR Rabbi. A number of us made our last appearance at Temple Beth Sholom for an especially auspicious Bar Mitzvah. We were there because Rabbi Bramly was there in support of the Bar Mitzvah child and we wanted to stand in solidarity with our Rabbi to show the board just how much we adored our Rabbi. We would field bitter email after bitter email from Temple Beth Sholom's board of directors first stating absolutely nothing, then outright lying to us, and finally capping it off by informing us on August 8th that they had asked for Rabbi Bramly's resignation stating, "This was a very difficult decision and takes into account all of your input, a detailed review of the impact of all circumstances related to the arrest, indictment and pending trial as well as specific performance prior to Rabbi Bramly's arrest on 23 March 2010. It became clear to us that he has lost the confidence of the board of directors and a percentage of the congregation" in the weeks FOLLOWING his arrest. This was later amended on August 18th, after Rabbi Bramly's lawyers sent a letter stating he would not be resigning, to say, "The decision was not based on an allegation, but rather on events and behaviors both before and after Rabbi Bramly’s arrest."
Anyone but me smell a rat?
By this point, I am positive that the board has completely lost the confidence of the congregation, as evidenced by the WAVE of Temple Beth Sholom congregants who maintain financial membership at TBS-EV SOLELY to support Rabbi Bramly but attend services at Chabad Chandler, Temple Chai, and various other synagogues in the valley. I have had the unusual pleasure of making the acquaintance of a number of these congregants, as I formally rescinded my Temple Beth Sholom membership the day they asked for Rabbi Bramly's resignation and started attending services at Chabad Chandler shortly after his arrest. It's always a pleasure for me to make a new friend, especially a new JEWISH friend, but it's especially powerful to be united with a new friend from the first conversation because we BOTH abandoned Temple Beth Sholom due to the way the board of directors has handled this situation. The problem is that, without a bug in our ear, we have no idea how to impeach the current synagogue president and the rest of the Temple Beth Sholom board of directors without waiting for the next general election.
Having attended Temple Beth Sholom for the auspicious Bar Mitzvah, my last act as a "member in good standing," I am left with the very distinct feeling that the president of the congregation has a personal vendetta with Rabbi Bramly. His cold and hostile reception of our beloved Rabbi that morning was noticed across the board and I think if we could have given a "tsk tsk" to him, we would have. I, for one, was completely in shock that someone could be so hostile to a rabbi he supposedly supported unconditionally. Obviously now I see the coup d'etat going on at Temple Beth Sholom at that time... the usurpation of the charismatic and quite strong-willed Rabbi Bramly and ultimate replacement with a more subservient Rabbi who would bow down to the board. Rabbi Bramly showing up was unexpected and it lends itself to the assumption of power. The President and the board want power; Rabbi Bramly HAS power. This isn't to say one should or shouldn't have power when it comes to congregants. I think this speaks to the compassionate way Rabbi Bramly has approached his congregation and the exclusive way the board of directors has approached the community. One welcomed anyone with open arms. The other reiterated the feeling that there was a clique in place and you were once again the social outcast. But at the time, I still firmly believed the board wanted what we ALL wanted, which was to have Rabbi Bramly once again take the pulpit and guide our tiny congregation.
I had been wrestling with my inner voices about renewing my membership at Temple Beth Sholom for quite some time by the time I got the August 18th email. Rabbi Bramly urged me to renew, stating that if he lost me as a member, he'd lose one more voice advocating for his return. I still wrestled with it. My ultimate decision to rescind my membership was accompanied by a very strongly worded letter that I sent ONLY to the Synagogue President because it basically outlined how this community has FAILED to be a community and is little better than a high school competition for who is the most popular.
In my letter to the membership committee, I detailed how, in the weeks following Rabbi Bramly's arrest, the synagogue community, which had sworn up and down that they would stand by me through anything and that I would always be welcome, suddenly all had more important things to do than to be a friend to me. At the town hall meeting with Rabbi Bramly's lawyers, before anyone asked about how I was doing, I was reminded that I owed dues. Nobody hugged me and nobody expressed concern when I remarked that I had been seriously ill in recent weeks. I had written House of Faith as an impassioned plea to the numerous fellow congregants who added me as a Facebook friend and got ZERO responses. Nothing in the WORLD prepared me for what happened after that blog was posted. I expected that I would attend shul and my fellow congregants would tell me I could lean on them. I expected a "warm, chamish community" like the Past President had outlined in her initial email to the congregation. What I found was a bunch of turned backs. A line was drawn in the sand and - it seemed to me at the time - that on one side was the majority of the congregation... and on the other side was me, Laura, and Rabbi Bramly. Standing by my rabbi was costing me every single relationship in the synagogue and it was beyond ridiculous. Most would expect that the pressure of the clique would have eventually worn me down and made me turn on my beloved rabbi just so I wouldn't be all alone and abandoned. They obviously have no idea who they're dealing with because the MINUTE I felt that clique like pressure to conform, I started mouthing off about what was ETHICAL in my mind (like standing behind a man who had always stood behind ME), as opposed to what was considered the popular opinion.
Then, as if straight out of a prayer, a lone voice rose up and said to me, "I heard the news. How are you holding up?" I'm not. My whole world has come crashing down. "Come to my house this Shabbos. We will eat and I will pray with you."
That lone voice came from an Orthodox friend of mine. I barely knew her at the time. We were Facebook friends and not much else. Yet, in the wake of the arrest, in the wake of my whole world tumbling down around me... she sought me out and offered me a hand to get through this most difficult period.
When I relay the stories that have clearly defined my life... the whispering voice that said the Shehecheyanu just behind my right ear the first time I stumbled my way through my first bracha after realizing Judaism was the right path for me... the Anthropology text falling off the chair and opening to the page of the Laetoli footprints when I was praying for advice on how to reconcile the science of my degree and the religion in my soul... flipping through a phone book and my finger landing on Temple Beth Sholom as I cried desperately for a new shul so I would have a reason to live once again... and even the Crazy Israeli who was thought up as a joke on a particularly bad night in 2007 and who magically fell out of the sky at me after a heart felt prayer to the heavens for a sign that it's time to move on... when I relay these stories to other people, I'm always told that there's a very clear divine presence in my life.
I will admit that many times in my life, I have doubted just how strongly Gd exists in my world.
But after the Crazy Israeli fell out of the sky... I can't doubt it any longer. Which is why I latched on to the hand provided to me by my Orthodox friends to guide me through the tunnel and my path back into the Jewish community came from a lone flashlight in the dark. As alone as I was, my prayers were answered the moment my friend sent that simple message.
Every single time I attempted to return to the Temple Beth Sholom community, I was shafted and ignored at every turn. I distinctly remember feeling like I was conversing inside the cone of silence while at the auspicious Bar Mitzvah. Inundated with people asking "How have you been" I almost wondered what would happen if I had given the honest answer. I wasn't holding up very well at ALL that day. It took every last ounce of my inner strength to wake up and put on a fake smile just so I didn't stand out. Had I answered with the honest truth... had I responded with "I've been suicidal" in my most nonchalant tone... would anyone have noticed? I honestly doubt it.
As opposed to the two times I put on a fake smile for my Orthodox friends and was immediately met with, "Now you're just bullshitting me. How are you REALLY doing?"
The letter further lashed out at the piss poor way that the board of directors has handled this whole Rabbi Bramly crisis, ranging from their refusal to allow Rabbi Bramly to hold his town hall in our synagogue to their demand that he resign without giving adequate cause. In tearing apart the synagogue congregant by congregant, I didn't hesitate to commit the most heinous foul a Southerner could ever do: I named names. I took everyone to task when finally snapping and lashing out at the horrendous way I had been treated. Yes, part of my resignation had to do with the shitty way they have treated my rabbi. But that was really just the straw that broke the camel's back. I took the synagogue to task for the shitty way they treated ME in the wake of the Rabbi Bramly scandal. Almost no one was left unscathed by my email. I will save everyone the trouble and state that I will not be naming these people on the blog. But my letter had to serve its own purpose and that was to tell the current Synagogue President quite frankly that HE is the one who has lost my confidence - not Rabbi Bramly. I don't even know the purpose of a Synagogue President, other than to say "I'm the most popular person here."
I wanted it to be CRYSTAL clear that I was leaving because of the way the inner circle has treated me as a lowly congregant. For my $40 per month, I expected to be included in a lot of things. I expected to be part of the exclusive club. I didn't expect to be given the run around on a number of occasions, outright shafted on others, and finally completely ignored. I didn't have a voice. The board made it crystal clear that none of us had voices when they asked for the rabbi's resignation. As much as I wanted to hang around in case they actually DID let Rabbi Bramly come back, I knew in the pit of my stomach that there was no home for me there.
Shortly before this letter was prompted, I had made the conscious decision to start getting more active within the local Jewish community. My Orthodox friends took me in like I was a relative and I was never made to feel like an outsider. Part of me has always stressed out around Orthodox people because I am a convert. The one time my conversion came up in conversation, there was just one question, "Was it halactic?" Yes, it was. Maybe it wasn't as "kosher" as the Rabbinate in Israel would like but after a LONG time in study, I went to a Beit Din with three kosher Jewish men, I said the articles of faith in front of this Beit Din where I promised to observe ALL the mitzvot, and I was properly supervised as I dunked in a kosher mikveh. Once I informed my Orthodox friends that, according to Jewish Law, I was a totally kosher convert, the issue was never again raised. It was never held against me that I was a convert. I was welcomed as if I had always BEEN Jewish. I'm even having membership at Chabad Chandler pushed upon me now that I have been going there on a semi-regular basis, which says to me that everyone totally accepts me as a Jew, even though I am a convert. Quite frankly, I would get more out of a $44 per month membership at Chabad Chandler than I ever got at Temple Beth Sholom. I know I am already a welcome friend at Chabad Chandler. If I try to disappear for too long, my friends at the synagogue get all uppity and start calling me to make sure I am ok.
I tried very hard to be accepted at Temple Beth Sholom. I came to worship Gd and for a small sense of community and instead, I found a community of back biters and gossips. I show up at the Orthodox shul, so beaten down by the latest in a long string of disappointments that liberal Judaism has heaped upon me, and I'm taken in as if I were a close relative. I joined a Chabad women's group and I get to sit among like minded women who all represent the spirit of inclusivity rather than the spirit of "We're old friends. You're new. I need to know all about you so I can hate you and exclude you and talk down to you." Nobody looks down on me because I don't know something. They don't treat me like a science project. People actually LISTEN when I tell them I'm not well. All along, I have only ever needed to feel INCLUDED. Even if it's just a few times a month, I need to feel like I belong to something. I have found that in the Orthodox community out here. I have genuine friends who genuinely care about me and treat me like a long lost sister. I have services that are intensely personal and intensely meaningful. Temple Beth Sholom has failed to provide that to me. They have had 2 years and some change to prove to me that I'm not a science project. They've never once treated me like kin. THAT is why I formally rescinded my membership. And damnit. Writing that letter felt GOOD. Nobody ever responded to it and I'm still on the synagogue's email list... so my assumption is that the President took the email and filed it under "Shit I don't wanna acknowledge." But FUCK did it feel GOOD to finally tear apart the people who have spent the last 2+ years treating me like a science project and scrutinizing my every move. Even if nothing else came of the letter, I felt a HELL of a lot better.
What surprised me most about the letter were the people I DIDN'T take to task about the whole thing. While MOST of the shul got named as offenders, there were more than a few names who were left out of my rampage. And despite all my shul bashing, there were a couple of people who were especially kind to me when I desperately needed to feel like I belonged. But the majority won out. The Clique weeded out the dissenters and I was no different.
As of the moment I write this blog, it occurs to me that Rabbi Bramly and I have not spoken in a couple of months, which is rare for us. It occurs to me that in formally rescinding my membership for the reasons detailed above, I may have lost the close relationship I once enjoyed with a man I will consider "My Rabbi" until the day I die. It saddens me a great deal that I can't have BOTH the feeling of community and inclusiveness that I have at Chabad AND the Rabbi I love so dearly. But if I had to pick a group of backbiters or a group of devoted friends and the ONLY positive thing about the backbiters was a man who is like a father to me... I'm going to have to choose the mass that enveloped me in their warmth and hospitality as opposed to the one man I have stood by even in his bleakest hour. I adore Rabbi Bramly... but Temple Beth Sholom is no home to me and it never will be. The clique can have their building and their submissive Rabbi. I'd rather have a place to call home where I feel like a long lost sister than show up in the snake's pit and try to act like I have anti-venom on hand. I've been through enough. I'm tired of masks, people pleasing, and climbing the social ladder. I want to be totally accepted as I come. I want people to NOTICE when I've been missing for a couple of weeks and to check up on me. I don't want people staring off into space as I sit there and tell them what's in the darkest pit of my heart. I have always said that I would rejoin Temple Beth Sholom in a heartbeat if he were once again allowed to take the pulpit. But if this is what I get in return... a whole lot of nothing... What's anyone going to notice if one little girl just never comes back.
I can say with absolute certainty that the only people who will notice are the Membership VP, who currently insists I owe an OBSCENE amount of money for a "building fee" in addition to the back dues I supposedly owe because the LAST Membership VP did not impart the financial agreement I entered into back in December of 2009 to the NEW Membership VP, which was evident when I got slapped with a bill for back dues (Please sir, can I have ANOTHER reason not to go back to Temple Beth Sholom). I will be noticed by my Rabbi (obviously). And I think there might be one or two people who were not named in my scathing letter to the board that might always wonder what happened to me. But all in all, I doubt I will be missed.
And like clockwork, just as I had started settling into my new life as Boyfriend's girlfriend and an active member of my Chandler Orthodox community, the skies clouded over and Boyfriend lost his fucking mind. There's a lot to be said of what happened, but in keeping with the promise I made to keep my personal life off of this blog as much as I can, I don't feel the need to reiterate what happened. Besides, when I do, most people stare at me like I have three heads when I conclude by telling them that we worked it out. There was a lot that was going unsaid in our relationship and we finally aired all of our dirty laundry to each other. After about a week of fighting like rabid cats and dogs, we finally met up for a one-on-one conversation and decided to get back together.
We then went camping for four days up near Lake something-or-other near Prescott. It was there that the NEXT great revelation happened.
The Boyfriend and I were laying in a hammock, talking about where we wanted to be in 10, 15, or 20 years. I kinda blurted out that I secretly wanted to be a midwife. I didn't give it much thought when I said it but Boyfriend told me I needed to put some heavy research into becoming a midwife before he'd consider it as a possible vocation for me. Throughout my researching process, I found myself really CONSIDERING what I had said, and I have come to the conclusion that being a midwife is my life's calling. Gd is calling me to catch babies. That's my mission. I can't explain it really. I just feel it in my BONES that Gd is calling me to be a medicine woman to the Jewish community and to spend the rest of my life catching their babies.
In conversations with my Orthodox friends and my mother and even with the Boyfriend, it became glaringly apparent that this is the path I'm supposed to be on. And it could WORK. I don't want to waste your time with details but let's just say that this isn't another of my many hair-brained schemes that comes back to haunt me. This is a plan that is totally feasible.
Once upon a time, Rabbi Bramly told me he had a pipe dream of starting an "intentional community" of like-minded Jews where we could get back to letting NATURE dictate when we started and ended Shabbat... where we'd return to the fruit of the earth and just BE. When I first heard of this idea, I ran home and informed Boyfriend that if this ever comes to fruition, we're selling all our worldly possessions and we're MOVING to Rabbi Bramly's Jewish Hippie Commune. Within the framework of this knowledge... or even the knowledge that Boyfriend and I have often talked (in jest, usually) about selling all of our worldly possessions and running off to an Israeli Kibbutz... suddenly it makes total sense that I would want to devote the rest of my life to catching babies and being the community medicine woman for my Orthodox friends. I have been informed that if I were able to perform pelvic exams and prescribe medications (all things that a Certified Nurse Midwife can do), I would have a built in clientele of Orthodox Jewish women would are desperate for a female who knows Jewish Law as well as I do, who has a hand in the medical world and a hand in the natural, homeopathic world to turn to with their girl problems and to help them bless this world with more Jewish babies.
My head is blowing off just thinking of this grand plan. Even if Rabbi Bramly never starts up his "Intentional Community" there's still a need within the Jewish community for a fellow Jewish woman who can handle both the religious and the medical aspects of being a woman in the Orthodox community. Of course I won't limit my practice to ONLY Jewish women... but very obviously I will be providing a very Jewish perspective on gynecological health and procreation... one that's not often seen in the Midwifery community as it currently stands. It's all so exciting. It's starting to come together.
Then... as if a ray of sun just HAD to come bursting through the clouds, I left a really good therapy session to find an email on my phone from Rabbi Bramly. It said the following:
Dear Friends, Family and Colleagues,It is with great joy and hearts full of gratitude to God and to everyone who has stood with me and my family during the past six months, that Laura and I share the following wonderful news:
This morning in the New York County Supreme Court, Justice Rena Uviller, upon an application made by the District Attorney, dismissed all of the charges against me, bringing this six-month nightmare to an end.
In a letter addressed to the judge and my lawyers, the DA’s office clearly stated that their decision was not based on legal, technical or procedural grounds. Rather, that “after further investigation by our office… we have withdrawn all charges in this case.”
What JOYOUS news!! The New York DA finally pulled their heads out of their asses and realized that this was a LONG shot at best and Rabbi Bramly would come out victorious regardless. Obviously there's a lot to be said of the lawyers in this case and how having a good legal defense means a world of difference between innocent behind bars and charges being dropped. But the end result is the same - HE IS INNOCENT.
It pisses me off that the New York DA's office had to rake Rabbi Bramly's name through the coals, but once upon a time, he told me that something good would come about because of this experience. I cannot WAIT to see what happens.
What really got to me was piecing everything together. Me as the midwife, him as the Rabbi, Boyfriend as an apple picker or whatever the fuck he wants to be, kippah clad children under foot and an INTENTIONAL Jewish community where all are welcome and loved and accepted.
He's INNOCENT.
It all just blows my mind. I am so grateful to Hashem. This was TRULY the way we were meant to start the new year... me having found my calling, boyfriend and I having reconciled, and Rabbi Bramly being declared innocent.
*** UPDATE ***
Just as I was putting the finishing touches on this blog... I got an email from Temple Beth Sholom stating the following:
"The Board of Directors is especially pleased to learn that the charges against Rabbi Bramly have been dropped. We look forward to continuing discussions with Rabbi Bramly within the framework established by the USCJ. Our hearts and prayers continue to go out to all involved in these matters including Rabbi Bramly and his family."
I had to roll my eyes.
*** EDITED TO ADD ***
I found this statement from Rabbi Bramly on The East Valley Tribune and want it restated here:
"However, these baseless allegations against me have left us in financial peril, traumatized my family, has torn my congregation apart and led my synagogue's board to request my resignation."
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