An inspiring essay about being Jewish in America

The Bat Mitzvah Question - I Wasn’t Expecting: "Are We Safe at Synagogue?" Jan. 23, 2022 echo opinion published in The New York Times by Sarah Wildman.

In many synagogues in America, especially large congregations like the one my family and I attend, children receive a date for their bar or bat mitzvah years in advance.

Jewish in America

On this day, that child stands in front of the congregation and assumes the responsibilities of an adult, reading from the Torah and offering a commentary on the week’s teaching. It is a time of enormous celebration; it requires months of preparation.

So we knew, already in early 2019, that our daughter Orli would become a bat mitzvah on Jan. 15, 2022. It seemed auspicious: It would be the week of her 13th birthday; it was Martin Luther King Jr. weekend, a time of national introspection; and the portion of the Torah assigned to that week was resonant. In it the Jews cross the Red Sea, fleeing slavery, and enter the wilderness.

In the intervening years, our family began to better understand wandering in the wilderness, not only from the endless drag of the pandemic but also because some months after Orli received her bat mitzvah date, a CT scan revealed her liver was laden with tumors. Through two years of surgeries, chemotherapy and extended hospital stays, we held on to the idea that she might still stand in front of the congregation.

In families like ours, joy has a specific urgency. It cannot be delayed. We refused to move the date, even when COVID and Omicron changed our ability to invite everyone we wanted to see. 

Facing morphing uncertainties and vulnerability, we adapted. We did not have to reach deep to say the prayer of thanks for allowing us to reach this moment.

Torah in a synagogue

In congregations like my own, we do not use our phones on Shabbat, so we were unaware that around the time Orli began to recite from the Torah, 1,300 miles away, at Congregation Beth Israel in Colleyville, Texas, a man had taken the rabbi and congregants hostage. Later that night, when we learned what was still unfolding, my partner and I whispered to each other, hoping to shield Orli and her sister, Hana, a moment longer, to delay the inevitable question we knew we’d be asked: “Will it happen to us?” Orli had asked me the same question the week after Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue was attacked in October 2018. She worried that we could be bombed. In other words: Are we safe at synagogue?

To these questions, I can offer no concrete answer. I do not want to lie, though I am tempted to simply insist we will be fine. I tell them: Our synagogue is well fortified. But my uncertainty in a time of hate and violence, not unlike my uncertainty in the face of illness, destabilizes me. It is unsettling to allow your children to know, early on, just how very little control you really have. 

Indeed, vulnerability is always jarring; it is somehow more terrible when you are meant to be a comforting presence. Plus, I have no good models for these queries.

When I was a child, I had little to challenge my belief in my parents’ ability to keep us healthy. Conversations about fear were largely retrospective. We grew up with our Holocaust refugee relatives who had fled destitution and destruction to deliverance in an American promised land. The past was terrible, but we were in the present.

My children, meanwhile, are familiar with mediports, home fluids and daily pill regimens. The girls intimately know the difference between minor surgeries and major ones. They have grown accustomed to our synagogue’s metal detectors, bag checks and security guards; they know by name the permanent security officer at the door. Indeed, the officer knows Orli’s story well. When he saw us arrive on that Saturday morning for the bat mitzvah, he and my partner, Ian, embraced. They both cried.

In “Beshalach” (“When He Let Go”), the Torah portion read on Jan. 15, the Israelites celebrate their freedom, then panic in the face of uncertainty. They bitterly complain to Moses, who has led them out of Egypt, that they fear death by thirst or starvation awaits them in the wilderness. The portion ends with a battle with the Amalekites, a conflict, the Torah tells us, that continues from generation to generation. The Amalekites become a stand-in for a mythical eternal enemy, a symbol of any evil that subsequently arises against the Jewish community.

Star of David in a synagogue

As the months of Orli’s illness turned into years, and even when her scans were finally clear this past summer, uncertainty remained. In her sermon, Orli pushed back against the idea of an omnipresent God, or a God that favored Jews, or even God at all. She told the congregation she understood what it meant to feel alone, even abandoned. No deity had shown up in her hospital room, she said. Perhaps, she said, divinity was in being present for each other. When one of our rabbis offered Orli a blessing, she did not say that our daughter’s life would face no further hardship, but rather that hardships would be faced with the support of her community.

Illness has, at various points in these last two odd years, displaced my kids from their home, their sense of surety in what tomorrow will bring and in their belief that we can protect them. 

Security breaches have shifted their sense of safety. And yet, both experiences have shown us the capacity of our hearts not just to break, but also to stubbornly repair. We are far from the only community to feel insecure; we are not the only family to have experienced trauma. We have seen this country reckon with violence, and we recognize now it was a privilege to think we were protected. We have all felt alone in these last two illness-bounded years. Instead, we might see ourselves as together, but in a different, uncharted way, bound up in an effort to protect one another.

Orli’s middle name is Chaim, for my grandfather who fled Nazi-occupied Vienna at age 26. He was known for his knack for reinvention and unmitigated joy, even in the face of unimaginable loss. Upon my bat mitzvah, some 30 odd years before Orli’s, he sent me a letter: Now that I was coming of age in the Jewish community, he offered the words Moses says to Joshua, as he assumes the mantle of leadership. They are words meant to gird oneself in the face of challenge and responsibility, of obstacles and uncertainty. It is a command not to back down but to forge ahead. And so he did not write mazel tov, or congratulations, but hazak v’ematz, have strength and be courageous: The expression is not an endpoint, but a beginning.

Sarah Wildman is a staff editor and writer in The New York Times Opinion. She is the author of “Paper Love: Searching for the Girl My Grandfather Left Behind.”

Remember, Repair, Together - Tree of Life Synagogue memorial and commemoration

Day of programming announced to commemorate Oct. 27, 2018, massacre of eleven Jewish worshipers at the Tree of Life Synagogue, in Pittsburgh's Squirrel Hill neighborhood.

Planned events will include Torah study and opportunities for volunteering. 

Published in the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle by Toby Tabachinck

Initial plans have been announced for a day of activities marking the one-year commemoration of the Oct. 27 massacre at Tree of Life building, the most violent anti-Semitic attack in U.S. history.

Emblematic of the tenor of the day’s activities, to be held on Sunday, Oct. 27, 2019, is a new logo with the words “Remember,” “Repair” and “Together”.

Programming will focus on honoring the victims, families and survivors affected by the mass shooting, which took the lives of 11 congregants of Tree of Life*Or L’Simcha, New Light, and Dor Hadash congregations. 

The day will include speakers, Torah study, and a host of volunteer opportunities. A public memorial service to remember those murdered will be held at 5:00 p.m. at Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall in Oakland, Pennsylvania.

"Remember" is to honor the victims and their legacies, and to remember how Pittsburgh rallied behind the Jewish community after the shooting. This will largely be done at a community service at Soldiers and Sailors on Oct. 27.

"Repair" comes from a Hebrew saying that translates to "repair the world." This will be on the minds of volunteers during service projects that will be announced.

"Together", the Pittsburgh community will gather just as it did after the shooting.

A commemoration committee comprised of representatives of the 11 victims’ families are planning the program.

Other representatives included the City of Pittsburgh Department of Public Safety, the director of the Pittsburgh resiliency center, and other advisers.

“On October 27, 2019, we will commemorate one year since the attack with public events to honor the memories of the deceased and those most closely impacted,” said Rabbi Amy Bardack, planning committee chair and director of Jewish life and learning at the Federation. “The theme encompasses three elements. ‘Remember’ means recalling the lives that we lost and remembering the attack so that we can prevent future attacks. ‘Repair’ means both repairing emotional wounds in the community and repairing our sense of brokenness in ourselves and in the world. ‘Together’ means that we were heartened by the support we felt from the city, county, many different faith communities and diverse communities, and all over the world. ‘Together’ also means that we are not in this alone.”

Schedules for the events are still in the planning stage and will be available on the official website, www.pittsburghoct27.org.

“There are already over 30 community service sites that will be available,” noted Adam Hertzman, director of marketing for the Federation. “There will be a variety of different types of organizations throughout the city. We are conscious of the fact that the October 27 attacks affected not only the Jewish community, but really all of Pittsburgh, and that many different people of all faiths and diverse communities will potentially want to volunteer.”

The commemoration planning committee evolved from “the same committee that has been meeting almost from the beginning to coordinate help for the victims’ families and people with psychological trauma,” Hertzman explained.

The victims’ families have requested that the day be “non-political,” according to Hertzman, allowing the focus of the commemoration to be “on the lives we lost and the needs of the victims. We are hoping that the people who have political interests don’t choose to demonstrate or show their political leanings on that particular day.”

The day will provide an opportunity “for the community to come together,” said Barb Feige, executive director of TOL*OLS. “Not one entity owns the event– it happened to all of us. I think the lovely opportunities for both Torah study and volunteerism are particularly meaningful and a reflection of the dedication and the personalities of those we lost.”

The commemoration’s motto—“Remember,” “Repair” and “Together”—captures the essence of the overarching aims of the day, according to Ellen Surloff, immediate past president of Dor Hadash.

“We want to remember those of all three congregations who lost their lives on Oct. 27 and we want to honor them,” she said. “There will be opportunities to do service projects that day which will honor their memories. There will be opportunities for Torah study that day, and that will also honor their memories.

“The ‘repair’ is we are all going to be together, and we will be doing projects,” she continued. “’Together’ is just seeing the whole community come together and show support just like they did in the immediate aftermath. It’s really an opportunity to reflect on the people whose lives were lost, reflect on the last year and the impact it’s had on everyone, the survivors, the community, the greater Jewish community, the Jewish community in the world at large.”

Although there will be some events “that will be unique to the survivor group or unique to the three congregations,” public events have been scheduled “because just as the entire community, Jewish and non-Jewish, helped us to heal, they can help us to remember and honor on the one-year anniversary.”

While the programming for the day is designed to help the community remember and to heal, Rabbi Jonathan Perlman, spiritual leader of New Light and a member of the commemoration committee, is approaching the day of commemoration events with some apprehension.

“I’m a little skeptical,” he said. “There are people on the committee that expect a media spectacle, they expect a great deal of attention, Pittsburghers and people coming from elsewhere. And they say this is based on the evidence they have from other sites of tragedy, like in Parkland, or Colorado, Columbine, for the one-year anniversaries and other anniversaries. They said the same thing is going to happen here.

“I don’t know,” he said. “The thing is that I really feel that all the love and the hugging and the memorials and the goodness came out around the first two or three months of the killing. 

Pittsburghers really showed themselves, and showed themselves well. I don’t really see them coming back to say, ‘We need to do our own memorialization’ and turn this into a holiday where we return to the scene of the crime or go back and have another vigil with the same numbers.”

The “mood” for Perlman, is that “it is over,” he said.

“We all have our souvenirs and our t-shirts and bumper stickers and it’s not going to be in the same numbers as it was last year. And we are planning for a great number of people to come out. We are reserving Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall, expecting we are going to get the same numbers.

“I’m the skeptical one on the committee,” he said. “Everyone else seems to be very enthusiastic. What I don’t want to happen is that the people feel the pressure to go to all these activities and then be re-traumatized about what happened. I want them to feel positive about going forward.”

Still, Perlman praised the “creativity” of the planning committee, organizing a variety of volunteer opportunities, Torah study, and being mindful of the needs of the victims’ families.

Toby Tabachnick can be reached at ttabachnick@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org

Donald Trump "anti-Jewish" gibberish exposed in Florida

Three opinion letters published in the SunSentinel are prefaced by MaineWriter:  This is another Trump division mess led by Michael Glassner,  a Trumpzi lock step cult follower, who is trying to brand Trump opponents as being antisemitic. He is leading the political campaign of stoking division and fear in the electorate, by making false statements about people who oppose his warlock leader, that they are somehow tainted by "antisemitism".  

But it was Donald Trump who said that White Supremacists are "good people". Trump's comments made about Charlottesville in 2017, were a low point in his failed presidency.

There are no "good White Supremacists".  Moreover, there is no correlation whatsoever between following Donald Trump's chaotic rhetoric and anything resembling "sanity".  In other words, Michael Glassner and his racist boss make no sense. MaineWriter opinion, this terrible campaign about Trump's opponents being antisemitic has blessedly backfired. I strongly oppose Donald Trump because of his stupidly cruel, and evil policies. 

Proudly, I support Judaism for many reasons, not the least of which are because of the human generosity the Jews exhibit and their historically prayerful respect for the Torah.

At least, there are many people in South Florida who are not drinking the Glassner message about "Antisemitism", the stoking, trying to incite division among Trump opponents in the Resistance.  

Three opinion letters follow, published in the South Florida SunSentinel:

1.  Trump propaganda on Israel

This letter is in regard to the propaganda piece written by Michael Glassner, COO of Donald J. Trump for President, Inc. He’s not exactly an unbiased person giving an unbiased opinion. But I digress.

Glassner has obviously tipped the Republicans' hand as to what they will be campaigning on, regarding the Jewish vote in 2020. At the risk of invoking a stereotype of Jews, I think they are too smart to fall for it.

Most Democrats, and Jewish-Americans, who are questioning Israel are rightly doing so because of a concern that a foreign government, any foreign government, can have undue influence over our own government. Especially a government run by a corrupt, right-wing demagogue like Benjamin Netanyahu. 

Even some Jews in Israel have said the United States has too much influence over Israel.

Trump is supporting Israel because someone told him it would benefit him politically, and possibly financially. He has no more feeling in his heart for Israel than his neo-nazi, KKK inspired, Charlottesville-marching base.

Bill Longmuir, Margate 

Respect for reading the Torah- Respect for Judaism 

2.  Trump and Antisemitism

Michael Glassner, the (cult) Chief Operating Officer of Trump for President Inc., again attempts to infer that those not supporting Trump’s actions regarding Israel are anti-Semitic.

Shame on him for his blatant effort to manipulate people into thinking his or Trump’s false conclusion has any semblance of validity.

Netanyahu could be similarly described as anti-Semitic.

We know that is not true and we know that the Israeli population is divided in its opinions on the Golan Heights and the move of the U.S. Embassy to Israel.

The real issue which seems to get lost in the shuffle of this continuing politicization is whether Trump’s actions and statements make Israel safer and more secure as a nation. Let’s have that discussion as opposed to hypocritical fear mongering inferences of anti-Semitism.

Lawrence M. Kopelman  Fort Lauderdale

3.  Anti-Jewish jibberish

While it is perfectly normal for me to become upset when reading about another outrageous, immoral or unethical action by President Trump, the op-ed Wednesday from Michael Glassner made me absolutely apocalyptic!

Fortunately, when I reached the signature section, I realized that he is the COO of the Trump for president organization, which at least helps to explain his ignorant, bigoted, and uninformed editorial, which was littered with lies, innuendos and one sided-opinion, stated as fact.

Glassner would be better informed if he would spend some time studying Torah or at least reviewing some of the truly magnificent Jewish texts involving history, culture and philosophy. He would then have the benefit of actually understanding the history and background of Judaism, as opposed to simply being exposed to the ignorance, bias and white nationalism spirit his president is helping foster.

Lastly, many of my life long Jewish friends are now discussing the unbelievable negative connotations to us Jews that we are now grappling with, exactly because of Trump’s unilateral moves in the Middle East that were heralded by Glassner. We all expect it to come back to haunt us.

Walter Hollander  Fort Lauderdale

Vatican Document on Jews, Salvation, and Evangelization

"There cannot be two ways of salvation, therefore, since Christ is also the Redeemer of the Jews...."

Interesting information from the Vatican, helps clarify the Roman Catholic Church's position on Evangelizaton of the Jewish people.
(The Roman Catholic Church does not conduct institutional efforts directed to Jewish evangelization)

Vatican Document - The Gifts and the Calling of God are Irrevocable (GCGI)

Athough I'm certainly not a theologian, I wonder if there's any Biblical evidence to include Muslims in this message? Although I'm totally unqualified to speak on this subject, I just thought to ask the salient question. (Not answered in this document.)

By JIMMY AKIN

New Vatican Document on Jews, Salvation, and Evangelization
1) What is the new document?  It’s titled The Gifts and the Calling of God are Irrevocable (GCGI), and it was released by the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews.

The title is a quotation from St. Paul, who refers to how the Jewish people “are beloved for the sake of their forefathers. For the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable” (Rom. 11:28-29).

The document itself commemorates the fiftieth anniversary of Vatican II’s decree Nostra Aetate, which dealt with the Church’s relations with other religions and, in particular, with Judaism.

2) What authority does the new document have?

The preface to the document states:

The text is not a magisterial document or doctrinal teaching of the Catholic Church, but is a reflection prepared by the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews on current theological questions that have developed since the Second Vatican Council.

It therefore doesn't carry magersterial authority. Of course, when it repeats existing magisterial teaching, that is authoritative.

When it doesn’t, it offers insights into the Holy See’s current thinking. That includes the thinking of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which was involved in the drafting of the document and approved it before publication (as made clear at the press conference where the document was released).

3) What does the document contain?

It contains seven sections. The first surveys the history of Jewish-Catholic relations in the last fifty years, and the last deals with goals for the dialogue between the two communities (e.g., deeper understanding of each other, practical cooperation on social problems).

The middle sections deal with various theological questions.

Section 2 deals with the unique status of Jewish-Catholic dialogue. It makes the point that Christianity is rooted in Judaism, that Jesus and the first Christians were Jews, and that this means that the Church relates differently to Judaism than to any other world religion.

Section 3 deals with God’s revelation in the course of history and how it is viewed by the two communities. It notes, in particular, that for Jews the Torah (Genesis through Deuteronomy) is fundamental, while for Christians Jesus Christ is fundamental.

Section 4 deals with the relationship between the Old and New Testaments and between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant.

Section 5 deals with the universality of salvation in Christ and God’s unrevoked covenant with Israel.

Finally, section 6 deals with the Church’s mandate to evangelize in relation to Judaism.

In each of these sections there are a number of positive and encouraging points.

4) What are some of the positive and encouraging points?

There is too much material to unpack in detail, but some particular points of note deal with:
Supersessionism 

 (Maine Writer....????Supersessionism???? Read below)
The Old Covenant
Salvation
Evangelization

5) What is supersessionism, and what does the document say about it?

Supersessionism is the view that the Church has completely taken over the promises of God regarding Israel, so that today the Jewish people have no special status whatsoever.

The document notes that, although this view has been common in some periods of Church history, it is not the teaching of the Church.

In fact, the title of the document itself indicates a rejection of supersessionism: St. Paul’s point is that God still loves the Jewish people and they still have a special status before him, for he gave them gifts and a calling which are irrevocable.

Thus the document states:

The Church is called the new people of God (cf. "Nostra aetate", No.4) but not in the sense that the people of God of Israel has ceased to exist (GCGI 23).

6) What does the document say about the Old Covenant?
It repeats established Church teaching that the covenant God made with Israel remains valid and has not been revoked.

Interestingly, it points out that this teaching was not articulated by Nostra Aetate but was first taught explicitly by St. John Paul II in 1980 (GCGI 39).

The document thus quotes the Catechism when it says:

The Old Covenant has never been revoked (CCC 121).

What, precisely, this means is something that the document does not explore fully. However, here is a helpful discussion by Cardinal Avery Dulles.

7) What does the document say about salvation?

In the last few years a view has been proposed that there are two paths to salvation, one for Jews and one for Christians. We each have a covenant with God, the reasoning goes, so these are means of saving grace for both of us. There is no need for Jews to become Christians or for Christians to proclaim Jesus to Jews. They have their own arrangements with God, which are quite sufficient for them.

As attractive as this view might be for letting one off the hook with respect to evangelization, particularly in light of the historical persecution of Jews by Christians in many places, it is utterly inconsistent with the Biblical data.

Jesus wasn’t a gentile, and he did not die just for the sins of gentiles. He was a Jew, he died to redeem the Jewish people as well, and he made sure that the gospel was proclaimed first and foremost to the Jewish people in his own day. His first followers were Jews, and he told them, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me” (John 14:6).

Correspondingly, his Jewish followers understood that “there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

The “two paths” view proceeds from a fundamentally mistaken understanding of the Christian message, made possible in part by severing Christianity from its Jewish roots and treating it in an ahistorical manner, as if it were purely a gentile phenomenon.

The good news is that the new document rejects the two paths view, both forcefully and repeatedly:

Therefore there are not two paths to salvation according to the expression "Jews hold to the Torah, Christians hold to Christ." Christian faith proclaims that Christ’s work of salvation is universal and involves all mankind. God’s word is one single and undivided reality which takes concrete form in each respective historical context. . . .

Since God has never revoked his covenant with his people Israel, there cannot be different paths or approaches to God’s salvation. The theory that there may be two different paths to salvation, the Jewish path without Christ and the path with the Christ, whom Christians believe is Jesus of Nazareth, would in fact endanger the foundations of Christian faith. Confessing the universal and therefore also exclusive mediation of salvation through Jesus Christ belongs to the core of Christian faith. . . . [T]he Church and Judaism cannot be represented as "two parallel ways to salvation" . . .
[T]he Christian confession that there can be only one path to salvation . . .

There cannot be two ways of salvation, therefore, since Christ is also the Redeemer of the Jews in addition to the Gentiles (GCGI 25, 35, 36, 37).

One gets the sense that the authors of the document really wanted to nail the coffin shut on the two paths view, and this is heartening, for they are correct: The unique role of Jesus as the Savior of all mankind—Jews included—is fundamental to the Christian faith.

8) Does the document imply that non-Christian Jews cannot be saved?

No, and one would not expect it to. The Church acknowledges that salvation is possible for people who, through no fault of their own, do not embrace the Christian faith in this life. Thus Vatican II stated:

Those also can attain to salvation who through no fault of their own do not know the Gospel of Christ or His Church, yet sincerely seek God and moved by grace strive by their deeds to do His will as it is known to them through the dictates of conscience (Lumen Gentium 16).

In such cases, because Christ is the Savior of all men, it is still through Jesus that these people are saved. They simply do not realize that in this life.

Consequently, it is not a surprise when the new document states:

From the Christian confession that there can be only one path to salvation, however, it does not in any way follow that the Jews are excluded from God’s salvation because they do not believe in Jesus Christ as the Messiah of Israel and the Son of God (GCGI 36).

What is a bit surprising is that, instead of pointing to the Church’s established teaching that people who do not embrace the Christian faith through no fault of their own can be saved, the document points to elements in St. Paul’s thought in an attempt to show that he would have recognized the possibility of salvation for non-Christian Jews.

This part of the document is not repeating existing Church teaching, and so it is open to question. Personally, I need to think through the argument they make to see how well it works.

It also says, Jews are participants in God’s salvation, is theologically unquestionable, but how that can be possible without confessing Christ explicitly, is & remains an unfathomable divine mystery.

The first part of that is true, but I'm not sure what they mean by reference to it being an unfathomable mystery, unless they have in mind the mysterious way in which God applies his grace extra-sacramentally to all non-Christians who are saved.

9) What does the document say about evangelization?

It acknowledges that Christians have a duty to evangelize and that this includes Jewish people.

Many in the media and the blogosphere got this wrong (big surprise) and reported that the Holy See was saying that Christians should not evangelize Jews, but the document says otherwise.

The document did say that evangelizing Jewish people is a sensitive matter for multiple reasons, including the fact that for many Jews it seems to call into question their continued existence as a people and the fact that the history of Christian persecution of Jews, including the 20th century German Holocaust, hangs over the discussion.

It then draws a distinction between the Church supporting particular efforts directed to Jewish evangelization and the ordinary, organic efforts of individual Christians in sharing their faith with Jews.

Regarding the former, the document says:

In concrete terms this means that the Catholic Church neither conducts nor supports any specific institutional mission work directed towards Jews (GCGI 40).

The key word here is “institutional.” It’s saying that the Church doesn’t have a Pontifical Commission for the Conversion of Jews and that it does not provide support for independent institutions devoted to Jewish mission work (e.g., Catholic equivalents of Jews for Jesus).

The document goes on to say that “there is a principled rejection of an institutional Jewish mission.”

What principle they have in mind, I am not sure. One might understand why—for practical reasons—the Church does not have a dicastery of the Roman curia devoted to Jewish evangelization and not lend support to independent organizations doing this work.

For the Church to conduct or officially support institutional efforts at Jewish evangelization, in light of the history, could inflame Jewish sensibilities and serve as an impediment to the effective sharing of the gospel with Jewish individuals.

However, if they have something in mind beyond that, I am not sure what it is.

Despite the fact that the Church does not conduct institutional efforts directed to Jewish evangelization, the document acknowledges that Christians can and must share their faith with Jews, stating:

Christians are nonetheless called to bear witness to their faith in Jesus Christ also to Jews, although they should do so in a humble and sensitive manner, acknowledging that Jews are bearers of God’s Word, and particularly in view of the great tragedy of the Shoah [i.e., the Holocaust] (GCGI 40).

And thus membership in the Church is for Jewish as well as gentile believers in Christ:

Jesus . . . calls his Church from both Jews and Gentiles (cf. Eph 2:11-22) on the basis of faith in Christ and by means of baptism, through which there is incorporation into his Body which is the Church (GCGI 41).

It is and remains a qualitative definition of the Church of the New Covenant that it consists of Jews and Gentiles, even if the quantitative proportions of Jewish and Gentile Christians may initially give a different impression [GCGI 43]

Far from rejecting the idea that the gospel should be shared with Jesus’ own people, the new document calls for individuals Christians—Jewish and gentile—to share it with them, and in a loving and sensitive way.