I’m a Jew of Eastern European extraction. My family was wrecked by Hungary’s obliging arrow cross, the local fascist outfit that zestfully deported 400,000+ people to concentration camps. Then the Communists came and decided that we were all equal and divisions like religion had to go. As a consequence, religion was not a big thing in the guangho household and we grew up functionally as atheists.
Not long after we came to Philly, when I was about twelve years old, an African-American man asked me if I was Jewish (Is it the glasses?) I gave my stock answer, delivered in an eastern euro inflection: “We don’t discuss that.” He laughed and said I was Jewish and furthermore that’s ok.
I share this little tidbit because I get where Bernie is coming from- religion killed my family, ergo we’re not discussing it. But America is a different kettle of fish and, especially on the campaign trail, discussing it is all the rage.
Demonstrating religion is very different from being religious. I seem to recall some discussion in the Bible about welcoming strangers and treating them like kin or whatnot. I seem to recall something about fences being a bad thing. And wasn’t there a tidbit about treating people alike even if they had different skin colors? Feeding the poor was a hit. Bankers weren’t.
But in American religion appearance is key. Dress up, do your hair, go to church with other well dressed people with nice hair. Go to shul, say your prayers, bend the knees at the right moments. How you actually behave day to day is completely irrelevant. Wanna grab a juicy ham and cheese sandwich for dinner after Friday services are over at the shul? Go for it. Just don’t tell anyone and if anyone asks, ostentatiously declare that you’d never do such a thing. Feh. Unthinkable.
Bernie has this backwards. He shows up at Liberty U in Virginia, founded by Jerry Falwell, a guy who cobbled together the so called Christian conservatives by playing on fears of integration, tells them that “I would hope and I believe that every person in this room today understands that it is unacceptable to judge people, to discriminate against people based on the color of their skin” and then actually expects them to do it. Where’s the prayer circle? The bowed heads? The collection plate? They wanted golden roast chicken with stuffing and you give them stalks of spinach. What the hell is the matter with you?
Trump? Now Trump has this religion thing down man. He’s got Corinthians, great big Corinthians, huge Corinthians, the best ones ever. He’s gonna kick John’s ass. Who does that guy think he is huh? Going on about “grace and truth” and whatnot. Grace is for losers man. What are you, some kinda Meskin? Now this is religion America can relate to. No spinach here just a bumper sticker- Second place is first loser.
Hillary gets religion too. Hillary, she’s been to church. She’s probably visited every AME church in the Carolinas. Knows the hymms. Can put on what she thinks of as a Black American accent. Sure she stood idly by as her hubby gutted the economy and devastated innumerable Black American communities- Detroit for instance- with trade deals. Sure, her hubby split after New Hampshire, went down to Arkansas and did a grave dance after Ricky Ray Rector. Sure, they treated Barack Obama poorly and her hubby said that he should be getting coffee for them and his candidacy is a “fairy tale”. But she knows the lines. She has the best lines.
Now, Bernie, being Jewish, can’t very well go to church and deliver a sermon. But couldn’t he at least put on a yarmulke and wax nostalgic about Sunday school and summer camp? So what if he didn’t go? You can bet that Donald went to the best, most religious summer camp ever with the Corinthian brothers, big shots, really tough guys, and Donald, he learned lots from those guys.
After all, as Michael Chabon reminds us, every generation loses the Messiah it has failed to deserve.