Jewish Friend Is Thinking About Jesus & Religion Lately

[lilac_angel]

I received a message from a friend today who has been raised Jewish, went to Hebrew school, etc. I believe her family is reform, so they weren't ultra-strict, but I remember when I was younger that she still did things like not eating certain foods at my house and doing the handwashing. As she got older, she seemed to be less strict with those things.

For a while, she has not been sure about religion and where exactly she stood even within her own religion. Most of the time she does not mention it at all. But today, a little out of the blue, I received a message from her:

"I've been thinking about religion and Jesus and things lately. I don't know where I stand in the grand scheme of things. I don't feel like a very good Jew. I know God loves me but I don't quite know who God is these days-- one entity, or a man. I've always been taught the Lord God is one, and "Thou shalt have no other Gods before me". This comes after a long time of meeting friends with strong beliefs and trying so hard to understand but coming up empty-handed. I'm so afraid if I changed my beliefs my family would turn their back on me. I'm crying a lot today."

I was wondering where I should even start. This is a huge thing to hear from her and I am joyful to hear that she may actually be pulled toward a faith in Christ! However, I don't want to say anything wrong, lol. If anyone has any advice as to what to say, I would be very grateful.

Edited September 10, 2008 by lilac_angel

[HisChildForever]

It looks like Jesus is trying to get a hold of her.

You definitely want to be comforting. Also, you don't want to overwhelm her. However, you're going to have to be the judge of that - since she's the one reaching out to you, she's expecting to hear a good deal about Christ, just don't launch into anything intense like the Eucharist. (If you do, offer a sentence or two instead of three chunky paragraphs!)

My actual suggestion - besides consoling her (her fears about her family) - is to gently explain how you came to know Christ, whether you were born Catholic or converted. Maybe you can relate to her - perhaps your family wasn't very encouraging but over time they accepted it. If this isn't the case, I'm sure you can tell her that plenty of Catholics have to "deal" with their families, so she's not alone. Maybe you know specifically of one Catholic who struggles with his/her family, and this you can share (while protecting your friend's privacy, of course).

So give a little, and then after her response, give a lot. Once you give her a little bit, she'll be able to ask specific questions, and then you can elaborate.

Good luck!!!

[SaintOlaf]

Check out the Surprised by Truth series, edited by Patrick Madrid. I think the 2nd volume has a story about a Jewish person becoming a Catholic.

I'm not sure exactly of her personal disposition, but I know for a lot of people a brief conversion story can be extremely inspirational, showing that they aren't the first going through what they're going through, and giving them something to identify with.

[LouisvilleFan]

[quote name='lilac_angel' post='1652531' date='Sep 10 2008, 08:23 PM']I received a message from a friend today who has been raised Jewish, went to Hebrew school, etc. I believe her family is reform, so they weren't ultra-strict, but I remember when I was younger that she still did things like not eating certain foods at my house and doing the handwashing. As she got older, she seemed to be less strict with those things.

For a while, she has not been sure about religion and where exactly she stood even within her own religion. Most of the time she does not mention it at all. But today, a little out of the blue, I received a message from her:

"I've been thinking about religion and Jesus and things lately. I don't know where I stand in the grand scheme of things. I don't feel like a very good Jew. I know God loves me but I don't quite know who God is these days-- one entity, or a man. I've always been taught the Lord God is one, and "Thou shalt have no other Gods before me". This comes after a long time of meeting friends with strong beliefs and trying so hard to understand but coming up empty-handed. I'm so afraid if I changed my beliefs my family would turn their back on me. I'm crying a lot today."

I was wondering where I should even start. This is a huge thing to hear from her and I am joyful to hear that she may actually be pulled toward a faith in Christ! However, I don't want to say anything wrong, lol. If anyone has any advice as to what to say, I would be very grateful.[/quote]

Yeah, definitely need to sensitive to her family relationships. One would hope that if they truly love her, they will understand if she leaves the Jewish faith or becomes a Christian. If her family is Reformed Jewish, they are probably not going to worry about it a whole lot. There will almost always be some tension during that transition phase where they are getting used to the idea, but with time they'll adjust. It would probably be very helpful for her to hear the stories other Jewish converts, perhaps by looking into the Journey Home archives from EWTN or web sites devoted to Jewish converts to Christianity/Catholicism. Her family will be a major stumbling block.

Of course, Jesus addressed the issue a few times. Those verses may bring comfort, but they could also be discomforting because Jesus doesn't promise everything will be fine. Seeing as she hasn't committed her life to following Christ yet, she probably isn't ready to hear the "hate your father and mother" passage yet.

That aside, the one thing she says that caught my attention is the concern about being a "good Jew." I find that interesting since many Catholics use the same terminology referring to "good Catholics" and "bad Catholics." This is about the silliest novelty to come up in the Church since selling indulgences. What is a "good Catholic," really? Someone who attends daily Mass, aims to live a moral life in obedience to the Church, and goes to Confession every few weeks or months? What kind of "good Catholic" finds it necessary to confess their sins so frequently?

If she's considering Catholicism, I really think she may find great comfort in getting out of that "being good" box that nobody can live up to. Catholicism and Orthodoxy are the only faiths in the world whose followers are expected to personally confess to another person specifically how we've failed to obey our God. Unfortunately, the old Catholic guilt treatment gets tossed around, but the fact is Catholics are not only invited to confess our sins, we are required to do so at least once a year. So that "be a good whatever" junk is out the window.

Of course, as St. Paul wrote, this isn't a license to sin, because we are expected to pursue holiness. The difference is we have a tangible means to seek God's help every time we fail and put every failure behind us for good.

As I like to tell people, I'm not a very good Catholic, so I go to Confession every few weeks.

[lilac_angel]

[quote name='LouisvilleFan' post='1652596' date='Sep 10 2008, 08:21 PM']If her family is Reformed Jewish, they are probably not going to worry about it a whole lot. There will almost always be some tension during that transition phase where they are getting used to the idea, but with time they'll adjust. It would probably be very helpful for her to hear the stories other Jewish converts, perhaps by looking into the Journey Home archives from EWTN or web sites devoted to Jewish converts to Christianity/Catholicism. Her family will be a major stumbling block.[/quote]

It his true that her family will likely be a very, very big stumbling block. Well, her dad's pretty laid back, but her mother... I can't even imagine. She seems to like having a lot of control over her and even sometimes treats her as a child, even though my friend currently lives across the country from her and is an adult. Though I don't know for sure if her faith is one of the issues that her mother would flip out over, she has flipped out majorly (this is putting it mildly) over plenty of other things. My friend however loves and respects her mother very much and is very sensitive and upset about upsetting her...

Thanks for the other info, so much, very good ideas so far.

Edited September 11, 2008 by lilac_angel

[lilac_angel]

I also wanted to mention that her disposition is very sweet and sensitive and open to hearing encouraging things so I don't think she'd just dismiss anything I say out of cynicism, but I won't say that she isn't without doubts, as I've talked about Catholicism to her before. This was a while ago, though, and I feel that both of us care more these days.

Edited September 11, 2008 by lilac_angel

[CatherineM]

We have a Jew in RCIA this year, so we've just been talking about this. Direct her to those books in our Old Testament that aren't in the Protestant Old Testament. These books were originally removed from the Jewish Canon in response to the threat from Christianity. They are very Messianic, especially some of the stuff in Daniel.

[Madame Vengier]

Your friend may be interested in this group. I am sure they would be more than happy to answer any questions she may have. She can contact them out of the blue. I know of some of these people and they are super wonderful folks. David Moss and Rosslyn Moss (brother and sister) are excellent people to contact.

[url="http://hebrewcatholic.org/"]http://hebrewcatholic.org/[/url]

There is also a major conference on Israel and the Church coming here in DC in about 2 weeks. Many folks from the Hebrew Catholic community are giving talks at this conference. Don't know if your friend is in the DC area at all.

[url="http://www.insidethevatican.com/conference.htm"]http://www.insidethevatican.com/conference.htm[/url]

Please also recommend this book to her:

[url="http://www.salvationisfromthejews.com/"]http://www.salvationisfromthejews.com/[/url]

The author is from the Hebrew Catholic community and a speaker at the above-mentioned conference. Your friend could contact him as well.

Edited September 11, 2008 by Madame Vengier

[lilac_angel]

Thank you so much. Every one of your posts have been sooo helpful and I never would have thought or knew about most of these things at all! I haven't written her back yet, but will soon.

[thessalonian]

as I said in apologetics, Rosalind Moss is a great speaker on the topic. I think you can find some audio of her at www.catholic.com.

[thessalonian]

Here she:
[url="http://catholiccommunityradio.com/audio/Rosalind_Moss.mp3"]http://catholiccommunityradio.com/audio/Rosalind_Moss.mp3[/url]
[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qd3qx_-bBkM"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qd3qx_-bBkM[/url]

[jeffpugh]

[quote name='lilac_angel' post='1652531' date='Sep 10 2008, 07:23 PM']I received a message from a friend today who has been raised Jewish, went to Hebrew school, etc. I believe her family is reform, so they weren't ultra-strict, but I remember when I was younger that she still did things like not eating certain foods at my house and doing the handwashing. As she got older, she seemed to be less strict with those things.

For a while, she has not been sure about religion and where exactly she stood even within her own religion. Most of the time she does not mention it at all. But today, a little out of the blue, I received a message from her:

"I've been thinking about religion and Jesus and things lately. I don't know where I stand in the grand scheme of things. I don't feel like a very good Jew. I know God loves me but I don't quite know who God is these days-- one entity, or a man. I've always been taught the Lord God is one, and "Thou shalt have no other Gods before me". This comes after a long time of meeting friends with strong beliefs and trying so hard to understand but coming up empty-handed. I'm so afraid if I changed my beliefs my family would turn their back on me. I'm crying a lot today."

I was wondering where I should even start. This is a huge thing to hear from her and I am joyful to hear that she may actually be pulled toward a faith in Christ! However, I don't want to say anything wrong, lol. If anyone has any advice as to what to say, I would be very grateful.[/quote]
Well, to start, can you go see her? Hang out with her and just talk. That would probably help a lot. First, listen to her, then talk about it. Start with who God is... use the old Testament, especially the deuterocanonical (sp?) book. Like others have said, it's pretty messianic, and it has much of the practices of the pre-rabbinic Judaism, which I'm guessing what she is striving for as a "good Jew". I suppose you need to prove to her that being "Catholic Christian" is being a "Good Jew" because we are the new Judaism.

[quote name='lilac_angel' post='1652608' date='Sep 10 2008, 08:28 PM']It his true that her family will likely be a very, very big stumbling block. Well, her dad's pretty laid back, but her mother... I can't even imagine. She seems to like having a lot of control over her and even sometimes treats her as a child, even though my friend currently lives across the country from her and is an adult. Though I don't know for sure if her faith is one of the issues that her mother would flip out over, she has flipped out majorly (this is putting it mildly) over plenty of other things. My friend however loves and respects her mother very much and is very sensitive and upset about upsetting her...

Thanks for the other info, so much, very good ideas so far.[/quote]
I empathise with your friend very much.

[quote name='lilac_angel' post='1652613' date='Sep 10 2008, 08:33 PM']I also wanted to mention that her disposition is very sweet and sensitive and open to hearing encouraging things so I don't think she'd just dismiss anything I say out of cynicism, but I won't say that she isn't without doubts, as I've talked about Catholicism to her before. This was a while ago, though, and I feel that both of us care more these days.[/quote]
That's good. Emphasis on the sit down and talk... even if it's on the phone? Or VoIP on MSN.

[lilac_angel]

[quote name='Sacred Music Man' post='1653392' date='Sep 11 2008, 06:25 PM']Well, to start, can you go see her? Hang out with her and just talk. That would probably help a lot. First, listen to her, then talk about it. Start with who God is... use the old Testament, especially the deuterocanonical (sp?) book. Like others have said, it's pretty messianic, and it has much of the practices of the pre-rabbinic Judaism, which I'm guessing what she is striving for as a "good Jew". I suppose you need to prove to her that being "Catholic Christian" is being a "Good Jew" because we are the new Judaism.


I empathise with your friend very much.


That's good. Emphasis on the sit down and talk... even if it's on the phone? Or VoIP on MSN. [/quote]

Actually, she lives across the country from me now. And I seem to be better at communicating in depth ideas in a convincing or meaningful way via text. If I felt more knowledgable on things, it wouldn't be as much of a problem, but I feel like I need to brush up on a few things myself..

Thank you much!! I think you were right on topic re: the "good Jew" thing. A lot of the ritual practices, I know that, started losing their appeal, but it could have also been the theology itself may have eluded her or didn't really appeal to her spiritually.

Edited September 12, 2008 by lilac_angel

[HolyPhoenix]

I can't do much to help what you need to tell her to finish conversion, but I would like to add, make sure that you pray for her. Prayers are very powerful as you probably know. Oh, and it would be great if you gave her a green scapular. This is a scapular created for conversion.

[CatherineM]

You might also want to get her some Edith Stein stuff.