CLAL Special Features
Welcome to CLAL Special Features where you will find articles by guest columnists and roundtables on hot issues and special topics.
Jewish Public Forum Seminar:
“What Is Religion For?”
November 19, 2001
Pre-Seminar
Response
“What Is Religion For?”
By Brad Hirschfield
In the past weeks I have found myself
increasingly bothered by the thought that what is commonly understood as religion seems
better at providing simplistic, dichotomizing, overly narrow answers at moments of pain,
than it does at shaping our questions, framing our pursuit of answers, and remaining
relevant at moments other than crisis (note all those clergy who can not wait to tell
stories of their packed pews). Of course,
this is not a particularly new concern for many people, but when trying to wrestle with it
while remaining within a particular religious framework, it seems to be getting harder all
the time. We seem to be a culture divided
between those whose outward focus is not all that different from those who they claim to
most oppose, and those who confuse seeking spiritual depth, with turning inward.
The Jewish tradition that I know
and love best feels increasingly small - even constraining - in ways that it never has
before, and simultaneously more important than ever.
I do not remember a time when the need for familiar connections and contexts
was quite so acute. Yet, how do we use those
experiences of connection that are the hallmark of religion (at least, as it should be),
to heighten our awareness and connection to wider networks of individuals, communities,
and ideas? How can we create sufficiently
loving and nurturing experiences that enable people to ask tough questions of themselves
and their most deeply held beliefs? How can a
particular tradition be about doing that, more than about it’s own self-justification
or promulgation?
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