Dear Friends,

In 1948, my late father-in-law, Simcha Kling, was ordained as a rabbi at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in New York. Soon after ordination, he and my late mother-in-law, Edith, traveled to St. Louis for his first rabbinic post, as Assistant Rabbi and Educational Director at Congregation B'nai Amoona in St. Louis.

At the time, B'nai Amoona was in the midst of building a new building. They had engaged the world-famous architect and refugee from Nazi Germany, Erich Mendelsohn, to design a new modern home for the congregation. Within a year, the congregation moved to its new location in the St. Louis neighborhood known as University City (or, "U City," to locals).

(Congregation B'nai Amoona, 1950-1986, in University City, St. Louis; now the home of COCA, the St. Louis Center of Creative Arts.)

The University City neighborhood of St. Louis, MO (in yellow)

My father-in-law served in St. Louis for several years. That's where my wife, Elana, was born. During that time, the family lived in U City.  I traveled there a few years ago when my son was a student at Washington University in St. Louis.  We walked through the U City neighborhood and saw the building in which my late father-in-law had served. (It is now the home of COCA, the St. Louis Center of Creative Arts, which purchased it from B'nai Amoona when the congregation moved further west in 1986.)

On that trip to St. Louis, I visited Chaim (z"l) and Marilyn Zimbalist, the parents of our Educational Director, Alisa Levine. Over lunch, I asked an innocent question about the Jewish community in town. Before I knew it, Chaim had pulled out a pencil and paper and proceeded to draw me a map and identify on it all of the past and present Jewish institutions in the St. Louis metropolitan area.  It was a tour de force.  I felt as though I had been given an excellent seminar on the history of the Jews of St. Louis. (Indeed, I had.)

I thought about that encounter when I heard the news this past week of the desecration of over 150 graves at the Chesed Shel Emeth ("True Lovingkindness") Jewish cemetery in University City, St. Louis. Many of those graves date back to the early years of Jewish settlement in the area, in the early 1900s.

It is too soon to know whether this was a so-called "hate crime."  But it isn't too soon to see it as a serious blow to the sense of security and well-being of Jews, not only in St. Louis, but all over America.  

As we know, there has been a disturbing wave of antisemitic attacks during the past few months.  There have been 69 bomb threats against JCCs all across the country -- including in our own backyard. The headquarters of the ADL in New York had to be evacuated yesterday. Swastikas have proliferated. Anti-Jewish graffiti and other antisemitic actions have become more common.  For a long time, there was no reaction from the White House.  On top of that came the White House's Holocaust Remembrance Day message -- which strikingly refrained from mentioning Jews.  

But then this week the President denounced antisemitic violence. And then came Vice President Pence's surprise visit to the Chesed Shel Emeth Cemetery (click on picture below for video).  

I found it gratifying to hear the Vice President's words of support and comfort and to see him raking debris at the cemetery.  He said what had needed to be said for some time. And he did what was right, and attempted to bring assurance to the Jewish community.

I've always been ambivalent about speaking about antisemitism. I am attracted by Judaism. I love being a Jew despite , not because of antisemitism.  Often -- sometimes, too often, in my view -- people focus on antisemitism as if it can inspire Jews to be more Jewish. I don't believe it can.  Antisemitism is about the price of being a Jew; not the payoff .  

And yet, it's essential for us to be aware that, yes, there still are people in the world who hate Jews, who aren't ashamed to express and to demonstrate that hatred. And we shouldn't ignore that.

I will be speaking about "Antisemitism: Then and Now" on Sunday morning, March 12th, at 10:00 am.  It's an apt time because it's the morning of Purim.   We'll be looking at the ancient Book of Esther and asking ourselves whether, and if so how, things have changed since then. For example, according to the story recounted in the Book of Esther, the safety and security of the Jews suddenly drastically diminished -- and then, they increased equally suddenly and dramatically. Does that feel familiar? Can you imagine one or the other -- or both -- happening today? Also, in the Book of Esther, one famous Jew (Queen Esther) tried to "pass" as a gentile.  Does this still happen today?  Indeed, do we ever find ourselves trying to pass? Please join us for what I hope will be an illuminating discussion. We'll be meeting right after the unabridged reading of the megillah (which will be a part of our morning minyan beginning at 8:30 that morning) and right before the abridged, Family Megillah Reading, which starts at 11:00 am.  

Again, the St. Louis cemetery desecration may not have been a hate crime; it may not have been motivated by antisemitism.  Yet in the present context, it certainly feeds into that perception.  I don't watch a lot of TV, and I had never previously seen Andy Cohen perform,  but when I heard about what he said on his show the other day, I couldn't resist including it in this post (click on the picture below).

I want to end on an optimistic note. When I watched Vice President Pence and Missouri Governor Eric Greitens come together with the many volunteers who had worked hard for many hours to clean up the Chesed Shel Emeth cemetery, I felt encouraged.  When I heard the Vice President state, emphatically, that "there is no place in America for hatred or acts of prejudice or violence or anti-Semitism," I felt encouraged.  And when I heard the Governor state that the President called him on Wednesday morning to thank the people of Missouri "for standing up in the fight against antisemitism," I felt encouraged. Our public officials were acknowledging publicly the dangers posed by hatred and bigotry and were resolving to take a firm stand against them.  Moreover, people of of all faiths, including a group of Muslims who had raised tens of thousands of dollars to aid in the cleanup, were standing alongside them. 

Charles Lindbergh, who was the first to fly solo across the Atlantic, named his plane, "The Spirit of St. Louis," in honor of his friends and supporters in St. Louis, where he was living at the time. Unfortunately, Lindbergh's legacy is tarnished by his connections with antisemitism. 

But the community support we saw expressed in St. Louis suggests that that name fits this moment.  Reflecting on how quickly that act of vandalism was deliberately -- and literally -- erased gives new meaning to the name. There is indeed a "Spirit of St. Louis," and it was on full display this past week in the way that people responded so quickly and generously to the desecration.  

Let's hope that, should similar assaults occur in the future, that same spirit will continue to manifest itself, all across our truly great country. 

Sincerely,

Rabbi Carl M. Perkins