Oh the Humanity!

On Sunday, January 18th, Adam and I were joined by my wife, Wendy, at the New York Society for Ethical Culture.


We happened to go on Martin Luther King Jr. weekend and ended up enjoying a service dedicated to MLK and celebrating the new President. This was where this service differed from many religious services. Whereas many places would simply acknowledge King's impact in their sermons or use it to talk about the week's scripture, this service completely revolved around Dr. King.

And that's where you realize how much of an oxymoronic place this is. The website's subtitle states that the New York Society for Ethical Culture is "a humanist religious community." It has all the aspects of religious service - the seating, programs, collection, and (worship?) leaders. But they don't worship anything. It challenges my definition of religion.

I walked away feeling like I had been to a nice event but not to an actual religious service. They cherish what is great in humanity, they celebrate it, and they challenge themselves to do better. But, there's no God. No mention of any kind of a Supreme Being or Higher Power. It/He/She simply seemed to not exist.

I understand the need to belong to something. Everyone has a need to belong to a group, to define themselves. The humanists have their place to gather. And, why not on Sunday when a lot of other people are gathering?

Overall, a nice service that completely lacked God. Somewhat strange to me and definitely lacking. But, then again, I am a believer.

Adam will probably post more on what the humanists believe and their history since he attended their informational session midweek. (hint to Adam: your turn to post)

Keeping the Faith at B'nai Jeshurun

As you'll probably note, this brief piece on our visit to B'nai Jeshurun comes about a month and half after the visit. I will be backdating the post to fit the chronology of our visit.

The big security guys at the door were a big sign that I was entering a synagogue on the Upper West Side. Security guards and police are, unfortunately, a very real and necessary presence at synagogues around our holy city.

I have to admit to arriving late to the service. So, while Adam had good seats on the first floor, I was quickly ushered up to the balcony that was also quickly filling up. Having been to numerous Shabbat Services in my life, I was quickly able to fall into the service, figure out what page to read in the siddur, etc. What caught me off-guard was the standing, sitting, bowing, and turning around that happened at the service. I've experienced it before but usually next to friends who know what they're doing. For the first time, I was sitting all by myself.

So, I did what anyone in my position would do out of respect for the service - I pretended to know what I was doing. I used my peripheral vision to know when to do what. I have to say, I was pretty darn good at it.

As Adam has already noted, the music was really good and the singing very soulful. I felt the longing for God that is missed in many Christian hymns.

The Rabbi's sermon was so brief that I had to ask Adam afterwards if I had missed it. Apparently I hadn't. Her short talk on the situation in Israel was pretty liberal but short enough that it didn't feel like a political speech. I'd be interested in going back to B'nai after visiting other synagogues to compare and contrast.

My favorite part of the whole experience was realizing that I recognized the synagogue from somewhere. So I leave you with the Ein Keloheinu from the movie Keeping the Faith:

(Yes, it was filmed at B'nai Jeshurun!)

A Jewish Experience

Last Friday, Christian and I went to the first non-Christian house of worship on this noble quest and headed to B'nai Jeshurun, a large and rapidly growing Synagogue on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, to experience a Friday night Shabbat service.

Most Synagogues are affiliated with one of the many movements within modern Judaism. However, B'nai Jeshurun, or BJ (they call it this, I didn't make it up), is independent of any movement and tries to meld parts of different movements and cultures within Judaism to create something unique. As is stated in a 2002 report BJ commissioned to examine the cause of its rapid growth:

[BJ] mix[es] traditional practice with non-traditional practice. They pull in the full range of the diasporic Jewish experience. As [one of the Rabbis at BJ] often jokes when asked "what kind" of a synagogue BJ is, "We are a synagogue with an Askenazic history and rabbis from South America that prays with a Conservative siddur, uses a Reform chumash and sings Middle Eastern and Hasidic melodies. What kind of synagogue are we? The Jewish kind!"

We chose BJ because, as I was doing research on religion in NYC, I kept seeing references to it as a center of Jewish life in NYC and to its success in bringing in large crowds of young and relatively non-religious Jews. In fact, it has been so successful in creating a buzz that since we started this project, every Jewish person that I have discussed Worship, Gotham! with has mentioned BJ as a place I should check out.

BJ holds its Friday night services at its main building, which is beautiful and thankfully didn't feel as if it was a Christian Church. There are two services every Friday night, one at 6:00 PM and the other at 7:30 PM. Everyone we spoke with suggested that the 7:30 service was the "good" service, so we went to that one.

By the time the service started the synagogue was packed with at least 500 people. The congregation at BJ seemed far more diverse than I was expecting. Virtually everyone was white, which is to be expected, but there were people there of all ages. Based on the everything that I had heard about the synagogue and its reputation for being a good place for younger adults, I was expecting the majority of people to be in their twenties and thirties, much like Redeemer. This was not the case.

The form of the service was a fairly standard Conservative Jewish Shabbat service. This was especially apparent because BJ uses Siddur Sim Shalom, the siddur used by many Conservative Synagogues in the U.S. The service was entirely in Hebrew, though at the start of each new prayer the Rabbi called out the page number for those of us who have limited Hebrew skills.

Rabbi Felicia Sol (BJ does have a female Rabbi, so even though it is independent it seems to lean towards Reform or more "progressive" Conservative Judaism) gave the sermon which, while good, wasn't that memorable. She spoke briefly on the situation in Israel, but otherwise I don't remember much of anything from her speech.

What really made the service at BJ different from any that I have ever been to was the music. Typically, most non-reform synagogues do not have musical instruments accompanying the Shabbat service. This is because of a rabbinical ruling that states that while music is not technically prohibited on Shabbat, it should not be allowed because fixing broken instruments on Shabbat is prohibited and if instruments are played on Shabbat this would lead to people fixing instruments (which to me sounds totally ridiculous, but if you are interested, check out these articles from Ask a Rabbi and Haaretz).

BJ has a small band that plays during the service, which is really good. The congregation also sounded enthusiastic about singing, which is rare. At the synagogue that I grew up going to, whenever the congregation was supposed to sing everyone would start off somewhat strong and then a line or two in would start trailing off and either stop singing entirely or start doing what I call the Hebrew school hum*. At BJ, it sounded as if only a handful of people were doing the hum and a good part of the congregation was singing and tapping and getting very into the spirit.

While it was an interesting experience, I was a little confused at why BJ has the reputation that it does. The service was probably more interesting than any I have ever been to, but it was relatively standard except for the music. What probably brings people to the Synagague and keeps them coming back is the large number of young people (even if it was less than Redeemer there were still a lot of cute girls in their 20s) and the hopes of finding a nice Jewish boy/girl. They also have a program dedicated to young adults that appears, from their website, to be fairly large and active and I'm sure has resulted in putting together more than a few couples.

Also, I noticed a few classes on the BJ website that seemed interesting and likely to draw some people back. In fact, I might be interesting in checking out one or two myself. In particular, the Learners Minyan on Sunday, January 25th seemed like something that would be worth attending. So even though I wasn't blown away by the service, I will likely be going back.

In all, it was a good start to branching out of Christianity on this quest, even though I didn't get any numbers from any cute Jewish girls. This coming Sunday we will be branching out of conventional religions entirely and going to the New York Society for Ethical Culture. I went to an info session on the religion/philosophy of the society on Wednesday and it seems like it will be an interesting experience. You should look forward to hearing our discussion.


*For those of you that don't know, the Hebrew school hum is something that is known to all Jews who had the misfortune of going to an after-school Hebrew school. It consists of singing the first one or two words of a prayer or song that you happened to memorize then humming the tune while moving your mouth so as to look like you are singing. This hum and mouth moving would be broken up every few lines when the rest of the group reached another part that you randomly had memorized and you felt the need to mumble somewhat loudly this memorized portion. This was done because none of us could read Hebrew fast enough to keep up with a song, no matter how slow it went, but if we stopped singing completely everyone would know that we were horrible Jews. Also, if enough of us stopped singing entirely, the teachers would get annoyed and make us start over, which was something to be avoided at all costs.

Redeemer Presbyterian Church

I'd like to apologize for being a little late with my post on Redeemer. Going forward I'd like to do the review a little bit sooner after we go to a service, but I was really lazy this week and didn't get around to writing down my thoughts until now. Christian's post was fairly comprehensive, so I don't have that much to add except for some minor thoughts.

I liked Redeemer. Part of the reason for this, I suspect, is that the church seems to be geared towards people like me. By that I mean professionals in their twenties or thirties who may not have a whole lot of experience with Christianity and who might not feel totally comfortable just walking into a church.

Because the service was held in a college auditorium, I felt a lot more comfortable walking inside. It can be intimidating walking into a house of worship, especially when it's not for a religion that you are a member of or if you are like me and don't have a whole lot of experience going to any houses of worship. Since the service was in a college auditorium and filled with people my own age, it felt like I was back in college and was going to see a speaker on some random topic. While not all of Redeemer's services are at Hunter College, having that option made it a little easier to visit.

For the service itself, it seemed to me to be a fairly standard Christian service. The Eucharist, a reading of the Apostle's Creed and a reading of portion of the Bible all played a role and made it very difficult to mistake this for anything but a very Christian religious experience. The other members of our group, who were all more familiar with Christianity that I am, thought there was something missing. I was unable to pick up on that while I was there. Thought, I will admit that I know no more now about Presbyterianism and how it differs from other branches of Christianity then I did before I went to Redeemer.

I do agree with Christian that Dr. Keller's sermon would have worked just as well as a motivational speech without the religious components. It was partially because of this that I enjoyed it as much as I did. In my limited religious experience, sermons in any religion can often feel very forced and dull. I'd prefer a sermon with a coherent and interesting moral or life message to one that forces a connection to God and doesn't flow well. This is one of the few sermons that I have heard that was interesting enough that I would feel compelled to go back again just to hear another.

The events that Redeemer listed in their bulletin also seemed much more likely than a typical Church to draw me in. In addition to the more typical volunteer and counseling events, I noticed a number of professional and social activities that I would be interested in checking out, if only for the networking opportunities. Based on the size of the church, I would also imagine that many of these events get a sizable number of people. Perhaps that's not the best reason to join a religious group, but if the idea is to create a community, Redeemer seems a lot more effective in creating an environment that fits Manhattan professionals and caters to their needs.

Something that also probably draws a lot of people to Redeemer is the chance to meet someone of the opposite sex (I can't seem to find any reference to homosexuality on their website or in their materials so I don't know how accepting they are for people trying to meet someone of the same sex to couple off with). There were hundreds of people at the meet-up after the service and there seemed to be a lot of individuals that weren't in groups that were probably looking to meet people and make new friends.

In a city like New York, a place to meet relatively sane and well adjusted people in their twenties and thirties is very rare and is very much a good thing. Just based off numbers alone, I'm sure hundreds of people have met their significant others there and I wouldn't be surprised if there have been more than a few marriages that resulted from meetings at Redeemer.

Redeemer might not be for everyone, but it seems to succeed in its efforts to cater towards a specific demographic. If you are a member of that demographic (young professionals) and are interested in religion I would definitely recommend checking it out. At the very least, as I said above, the sermon is more interesting than most that I have seen.

Redeemer Presbyterian Church

I like my churches to look the part. I want to see crosses, iconography, paintings, statues, arches, stained glass, etc. I'm sure it has a lot to do with my Catholic background and now Lutheran adventures. So, I'll get that part out of the way: Redeemer Presbyterian Church in NYC does not look like a church because it doesn't have it's own building.

Adam and I had the pleasure of being accompanied to church this Sunday by two good friends. There we were, a Jew, a Roman Christian, a follower of Meher Baba, and a lapsed Catholic sitting in the Hunter College Auditorium, all chuckling like Middle Schoolers at the graffiti some college student had left on the back of a seat. Let's just say they didn't like calculus.

The auditorium filled quickly to what I imagined was a little over a thousand worshipers. According to pre-visit research, Redeemer gets around 1,000 people at each of it's five worship services on Sundays. Incredible numbers for New York City, I think.

Once the service began, it was clear that this was not the liturgical, traditional stuff I love. The worship leader barely mentioned that historically Christians celebrate the Epiphany around this time before moving on to songs of praise. The music, I must say, was beautiful and the worship singer was pretty amazing. After three songs, though, I was longing for the meat.

And that's what I kept waiting for. There were a few spots that reminded me that this was an actual Sunday service: the Offertory, the Apostle's Creed, proclaiming the mystery of faith. But, even the Sermon lacked the meat and potatoes I sought.

Tim Keller, the pastor of Redeemer, appeared minutes before the Scripture Reading, and disappeared soon after the sermon. The Scripture Reading itself was from Genesis 2, the creation of Eve. In his sermon, titled The First Wedding, Dr. Keller identified three things that are necessary for the success of marriage: An eye for idolatry, patience, and humility. He went on to give a rather captivating sermon, intelligent and, at times, funny.

Dr. Keller reminded me of the college professor everyone loves. I can see the appeal of going to a Keller service. The young professionals in the crowd seemed enthralled by him. But, for me, the sermon seemed like a motivational speaker's presentation. It was good, but you could easily remove the Scripture and still have a good speech. Although we did hear about God's humility and Jesus dying on the cross, I felt like it wasn't the center of the sermon. Maybe it was supposed to be, but I simply didn't hear it that way.

This was the very first Presbyterian service I'd been to that wasn't a wedding, so there's a lot I still don't quite understand about Presbyterianism and their theology. I wonder how much of the service reflected the theology.

I can say that I appreciate what Redeemer Presbyterian is doing here in New York City. They've managed to build a church for young professionals that seems to draw growing numbers and do a lot of good in our community. Their post-service fellowship had hundreds of attendees and their bulletin listed numerous groups and missions serving a wide range of individuals and needs. It really seems like a great place to find a spiritual home and it seems like many have found it there.

It was my first Sunday attending two services, my own and our Worship, Gotham! visit, and I look forward to many more to come. It always helps to bring friends along to share in the experience and bounce ideas off of afterwards.

So, if you're reading this and want to join Adam and I on our Worship, Gotham! visits, let us know. I've created an "Upcoming Schedule" box in the right hand column so that you can join us.

Worship with us!

Editorial Note

I've been meaning to write about the service we attended at Trinity Lutheran and to try to clarify some of Adam's questions regarding Christianity. However, being that part of the reason we started Worship, Gotham! was to learn more about the religions of NYC as part of a journey, I've decided to simply let it be.

Our entries will stand as is. Our questions, our thoughts, and our perceptions as written here should stand as witness to our growth.

Wish us luck.