February 27 - Lent, Day 15 - The Obedience of Faith

"Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you." Genesis 12:1

Ah, yes. My old friend, Lech Lecha, the Torah portion I chanted at my Bat Mitzvah ceremony (this parasha was designated for me, incidentally, by virtue of the calendar rather than by my choosing, which I have always found quite remarkable), and a theme I am quite comfortable with, having lived it, written about it, and composed songs around it. Dr. Hahn begins this chapter by asking, what would it be like if God asked you to leave everything you knew, everything that was comfortable in your life, and travel to an unknown destination, far away?

In 2000, I did exactly that. I packed up my belongings and made a new home for myself in a new land - only 80 miles (and a body of water) geographically, but thousands of miles, culturally. That was the year that I began my conversion to the Jewish faith and moved to the heart of Jewish Boston in order to pursue becoming a cantor. I indeed felt called by God to make this journey (even though it didn't turn out exactly as I thought it would, ultimately, and I felt duped many times along the way; even up to fairly recently, before I had a glimpse of the beautiful way my life is now unfolding), a journey to a "land you do not know, a place I will show you;" a land where I was a stranger (the word for a convert, in fact, is ger - or gera in the feminine, which is translated as stranger), a new language and customs; a land fraught with high mountains (my studies), and scary, dark valleys (my loneliness).

This past summer, when I returned to my childhood home and to my beloved Catholic Church, I felt as if I had returned from a twelve year space mission to Mars. Or, from a dream; like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz where she wakes up, looks around at her family surrounding her, and realizes, "There's no place like home."

Lech Lecha - in Hebrew, literally: go to yourself (I wish Blogger would allow me to type in Hebrew. The way these two words are written in the Torah scroll, with no vowels, illustrates this point beautifully, simply: lamed chet - lamed chet). The way I interpret this is, sometimes you have to leave home to find your true home; to find yourself and ultimately, God.

The Genesis passage, above, continues: "I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you shall be a blessing." Genesis 12:2.

I believe that Abraham is the ultimate role model for our spiritual journey, that God calls each of us to leave our "father's house" - all that is safe and familiar; our roots - in order that we might find our true selves and our true home.

I've said this often along the way, "If you go around the block enough times, you end up right back at home."

I am very glad to have made the journey, and even more glad to be home.