More and more, families of different religions and faiths are marrying in America. I, myself, have been married for 11 years to my beautiful wife, who happens to be Catholic. I’m Jewish, and although we aren’t super religious people, God is important to both of us. Therefore, when we decided to get married we agreed that we would get a special dispensation from the Catholic Church, but get married in a synagogue, so our marriage would be sanctified in both of our religions. We also agreed before our marriage that when we had children we would raise them in the Jewish faith. Well, three kids later (my kids are four, six, and eight) I can say my wife has done a wonderful job creating a Jewish home for our children to be raised in. She worships with us, cooks the best matzo ball soup and kugel in Chicago, and is an active member in our congregation. She is also a wonderful wife and mother, not to mention my best friend.
My “honey” is the person that I chose to marry though, and having dated her for five years before we got married, I felt confident that I knew what to expect from her once we were. What I could not anticipate, however, was the warmth and love that my in-laws would show us in regards to celebrating our family’s holidays with us.
My children’s best friends are their cousins, who are my sister-in-law’s children, and they are Catholic. It really isn’t a big deal, but that’s because my in-laws (my wife’s mother, her two brothers, and her sister’s family) are gracious enough to come celebrate Hanukkah with us every year at our house, while we reciprocate by celebrating Christmas Eve with them at theirs. I can’t tell you how much it means to me that they all share in our celebration of The Festival of Lights, and I love sharing in their Christmas spectacular. I have some special in-laws and I know it and appreciate it.
That doesn’t mean that having an extended family with more than one religion in it is always a simple matter though. Sometimes, like this year, Christmas and Hanukkah occur at the same time. When this happens, we work around the overlap by scheduling our party either before or after Christmas Eve, depending on when Hanukkah lands on the Jewish calendar that particular year. Then, on Christmas Eve, we bring our menorah with us over to my in-law’s house and we celebrate both holidays together.
My wife’s family is Polish-American, and one of the more complicated things we’ve had to solve is how to incorporate their family tradition of breaking off pieces of Oplatki, which is a Polish Christmas wafer, and exchanging the pieces with loved ones while wishing them peace, love and happiness for the upcoming year. It is a beautiful tradition, and one that my mother-in-law brought with her from Poland. The problem for my family is that the wafers are like those given for communion, and represent the body of Christ. Because of this, we don’t think that it would be “kosher”, by either religion’s standards, for us to eat them. At first, we would give a kiss and bless each other, but my wife’s family would eat both of the wafers from the exchange.
Now we have solved the problem in a unique way, but one that keeps the family tradition intact without worrying about religious protocol. Because the symbolic meaning of Oplatki involves the breaking of bread with family, we now also have matzo to break and bless, along with the Oplatki, so that we feed them their Christmas wafers and they feed us our famous unleavened bread. The family tradition of the “breaking of the bread” is now intact! Our holiday system may not be perfect, but for our families it works well, and the important thing is that we are all together on these significant occasions. Lucky for me, love and respect has transcended all in my family. My holiday wish for you is that they will do the same in yours. Peace, God bless, and have a happy holiday, whatever it may be!