Homophobia, the Civil Partnership Act and Liberal Judaism's response by Elizabeth Tikvah Sarah - given on December 10th
What a difference a word makes: Our portion today, the parashah, Vayeitzei, begins: Vayeitzei Ya’akov, ‘Jacob went out’ (Genesis 28:10). A month ago, when we were reading about the Divine call to our first ancestor, in parashat Lech L’cha, four verses into the portion, we read: Vayeilech Avram, ‘Avram went’ (Genesis 12:4). So, while Avram went; Jacob went out: What’s the difference? The word Vayeitzei is based on the three Hebrew consonants, Yud Tzadi Alef, used to describe a ‘going out’ on a grand scale. We speak, for example of Y’tzi’at Mitzrayim, usually translated as the ‘Exodus from Egypt.’ The word Vayeilech, on the other hand, is based on the three Hebrew consonants, Hey Lameid, Chaf, meaning to go, or to walk, suggesting something far less dramatic.
If we examine the two narratives, it becomes clear what a difference a word makes: While Avram went forward, leaving Haran for Canaan; Jacob went back, leaving Canaan for Haran. While Avram left home with Sarai his wife, and with Lot, his nephew, and with his entire household – not to mention a whole retinue of people; Jacob left home on his own. While Avram chose to go – hearing the call of the Eternal One, Lech L’cha, ‘Go, for yourself’ (Gen. 12:1), he made the decision to leave – Jacob took flight: desperate to get away from the murderous anger of his brother, Esau, whom he had wronged by stealing the blessing due to him as the first-born. While Avram responded, not only to the call of God, but to the promise of a new destiny for his descendants; Jacob responded to an emergency, driven by no other urge than the need to save his skin. While Avram walked; Jacob ran.
One might say that while Avram was a migrant; Jacob was a refugee. What a difference a name makes. Since the time that Jacob took flight, our people has not simply migrated from place to place, we have also, at critical moments throughout our history, fled in fear for our lives. A few years ago December 10th was set aside as International Human Rights Day. For the past few years Human Rights campaigners have been particularly concerned with the issue of refugees because across the world at any moment, hundreds of thousands of people are in flight, propelled to leave their homes because staying put would mean certain capture, torture or death.
But it is sometimes hard for us to sympathise with masses of people. To feel moved by the plight of refugees, we need to hear individual stories and learn about individual experiences. Thinking about Jacob as a refugee and reflecting on what it might have felt like for him to flee in terror and find himself in the middle of nowhere, bedding down for the night with a stone for a pillow (Gen. 28:11), might help us to imagine what it might feel like to be a refugee – but not only a refugee, in the usual sense of someone fleeing religious, ethnic or political persecution.
There is another way of being a refugee – or, perhaps, exile, is a better word. Reading again about Jacob, having to leave home on his own, in flight for his life, made me think of all those individuals who have had to leave home to escape not the terror without, but the terror within: Those who’ve run away to escape violence or abuse, or to get away from a bullying sibling or from a parent who’s an alcoholic or mentally ill, or because they are different – and that difference is not accepted by their families. I’m thinking, in particular, of lesbian and gay young people, growing up as exiles in their own homes because they don’t fit into their parents’ expectations for their daughters and sons. Of course, many lesbian and gay young people stay at home, marginalised and isolated, because they’ve simply got nowhere else to go. And some of those who leave are actually thrown out by their parents.
But whether they stay at home, walk out the door of their own accord, or they are pushed, even today, in 2005, lesbian and gay young people live their lives in double-jeopardy: exiles at home; exiles on the street. According to research conducted by the Allsorts Youth Project for lesbian and gay young people in Brighton, set up seven years ago, even those lucky enough to find the haven that Allsorts provides in the way of counselling opportunities and a weekly drop-in, remain so vulnerable in their day-to-day lives and are subjected to such a level of homophobic bullying and attack – even in Brighton and Hove – that 60% attempted suicide last year – 80% of that number more than once – and two actually succeeded in killing themselves.
When we examine the experience of lesbian and gay young people, we get an insight into life at the sharp-end of day to day homophobia. For those who survive their youth and find a way of establishing their lives – by finding friends, work, a home, a partner – the challenge of day-to-day existence is less extreme, but not only do many lesbians and gay men still live in exile from their families, and in hiding at work, until last Monday, December 5th 2005, each and very lesbian and gay man was a second class citizen in the eyes of the State.
What a difference a law makes. Of course, there has been a huge change in social attitudes since I was young – and changes in the law, too, from 1967 onwards, which have made a difference to the lives of lesbian and gay people of all ages – but this week, we witnessed the most fundamental legal change yet, which will have the most profound impact. Until last Monday, it didn’t matter how long a same-sex couple had been together: If your partner went into hospital, you couldn’t be counted as next of kin; if your partner died, without leaving a will, their estate passed to their family of origin; and if she or he were sensible enough to make a will, you were still liable to pay inheritance tax. Under the terms of the Civil Partnership Act, same-sex couples who register their partnership at the Registry Office, get the same rights as married heterosexual couples – including, not only becoming each other’s next of kin, and being able to inherit directly from one another, but also the right to benefit from each other’s national insurance contributions, the right to financial support from one another, and the right to make financial claims on each other if the partnership is dissolved.
On Monday, Jess and I were invited to a reception at the House of Commons, hosted by the MPs of Brighton and Hove to celebrate the Civil Partnership Act coming into force. Before the Equalities Minister, Meg Munn, addressed the gathering, Celia Barlow, the new MP for Hove, spoke about how moving it had been to be at the Brighton Registry Office that morning and meet the first couples to register – all of whom had been together for over forty years. During the reception we talked with two of the Brighton Registrars, who told us how enthusiastic they and their colleagues were to be directly involved in making such a difference to the lives of lesbian and gay couples, and how much they were looking forward to the first ceremony due to take place in Brighton at 8am on December 21st solemnising the Civil Partnership of the Reverend Debbie Gaston and her partner, Elaine Gaston – who were also standing there, chatting warmly with them.
Yes, what a difference a law makes. But on Monday I wasn’t only celebrating the Civil Partnership Law. As I reported in this month’s newsletter, at the beginning of the new Millennium, the Rabbinic Conference of Liberal Judaism set up a Working Party, chaired by Rabbi Danny Rich, to explore the area of commitment ceremonies for same-sex couples. I was a member of the Working Party, and over the next three years the process of deliberation and consultation continued until a final version of a policy recommending commitment ceremonies and the full inclusion of lesbian and gay Jews into congregational life, was ready for presentation to the LJ Council – and so to the lay leaders of all the constituent congregations. Unanimously endorsed by the LJ Council in 2003, the focus of our activities moved to the creation of a ‘Service of Commitment for Same-Sex Couples’ and the production of a new leaflet entitled, ‘Lesbian and Gay Jews and Same-Sex Relationships’. Following another long process of deliberation, this past September, the Rabbinic Conference agreed the texts for both publications, which have just been printed to coincide with the Civil Partnership Act coming into force.
What a difference Liberal Judaism makes: Alone of all the Jewish denominations – and not for the first time, either – Liberal Judaism has been ready to meet the needs of people and the needs of the society in which we live, by creating a new liturgy enabling lesbian and gay Jews to sanctify their partnerships in a Jewish context. And, of course, Liberal Judaism is not only leading the way for Judaism: It is clear from the responses of the other religious groups that, apart from the Quakers, who have quietly been including lesbian and gay people for a long time, Liberal Judaism is the only religious grouping in Britain at this moment making it possible for a same-sex couple to participate in a public religious ceremony, conducted by a religious minister, inside a religious building. Indeed, it is precisely because the Church of England has refused to sanctify same-sex partnerships, that, unlike the law relating to Marriage, the Civil Partnership Act does not make it possible for couples to combine a Civil and religious ceremony – which means that same-sex Jewish couples wishing to have a Jewish ceremony must first go to the Registry Office, and obtain a Civil Partnership Certificate.
What a difference a day makes: Today is International Human Rights Day – but, sadly, it is not the day when Human Rights become a universal reality – and the Global Call for Action on Poverty, which is being highlighted today, and during the coming week, has not yet been heard by the major powers. Ten days ago it was World Aids Day – but, sadly, December 1st was not the day when we marked the end of the suffering caused by Aids. December 5th 2005 was a very different kind of day because on that day we didn’t simply express our hopes for a better day to come, we witnessed a new era, a transformation in the lives of lesbian ad gay people, and in the life of this country. As Liberal Jews, committed to the values of integrity, justice, equality, compassion and inclusion, and aware that God speaks to us not only through the ancient texts we have inherited, but also in our own time, we have much reason to feel proud that Liberal Judaism looked ahead to this moment, prepared for it, and has made such a unique contribution:
Blessed are You, Eternal One, our God, Sovereign of the Universe, who has kept us alive, and sustained us, and brought us to this time.
Baruch Atah, Adonai Eloheynu, Melech ha’Olam, shehecheyanu, v’kiy’manu, v’higi’anu laz’man hazeh.
And let us say: Amen.
Rabbi Elizabeth Tikvah Sarah
Brighton & Hove Progressive Synagogue – Adat Shalom Verei’ut
10th December 2005/9th Kislev 5766
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