Sunday, October 4, 2009

Mark attends Yom Kippur service in Wheaton, MD.

"As you enter the secondary auditorium in the building with the Hebrew school, they have a big map of Israel. Funny thing, the map has no mention of the West Bank, Palestine, Gaza, etc. The whole piece of land is labeled as Israel. Don’t we get our panties in a bunch when we point out there is no reference to Israel on the maps in the text books of other Middle Eastern countries?

And what YK service is complete without the Israel Bond drive. A guy comes to the podium, recites the neocon lines verbatim. Iran’s a threat, Ahmadinejad wants to wipe Israel off the map, rockets raining down from Gaza, Hezbullah threats from the north, etc. They need our help. Pass those pledge cards to the ushers. Well, even though times are tough, I seem to remember in previous years they’d get six or seven cards. Quite a bit more this year. It really surprised me.


One more thought. I never really picked up on this until this year. One of the prayers asks G-d to pardon and forgive us for HIS sake. For HIS sake? Am I reading this wrong? Has a Jewish comedian ever picked up on this? G-d, you really need to forgive me for YOUR sake. If I’ve been a jerk all year, I can make G-d feel better about himself if he pardons me? I guess I really am part of the "Chosen People"."
Mondoweiss

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