B”H
Dear all brothers and sisters at ‘Beyond Teshuva’.
I am writing to you in response to Matys Weiser’s video on YouTube (another convert) – I was so touched and moved when he (as a Ger) spoke of his abject loneliness as a convert – the same applies to me as a BT. I’m sure this is true of so many of us – I don’t understand this – are Ger and BT esteemed more in Hashem’s eyes because of how we prevailed under everything blocking us???
I’m now 54 and was raised in a non-observant family in 60’s UK – my mother’s (grandmother, grt grandmother) lineage was Jewish (Greenberg/Greenbaum, via Poland and Ukraine) but my grandmother married a goyim and was expelled from the family. So, our Jewish heritage was forbidden to be spoken of.
Now, please understand that I “woke up” to my heritage whilst in China – 3 years of the most lonely struggle I could have never imagined, but there was, Baruch Hashem, Chabad and Breslov on the internet.
I thought, after returning to Canada it would be easy to become part of a Jewish community, especially after spending 3 months in Israel, mostly in Sussya and Tsfat (a wonderful Chabad community!!). I was wrong. The local synagogue doesn’t want to know me because they think I’m a Chabadnik (which I am unashamedly so…….my only “Rabbi” for 3 years was Chabad on the net!), any Rabbi I email in my two communities close to me don’t respond – I might as well have stayed in China!!
Desperately lonely Jew here………life was so much easier as an atheist…….but then, Avraham Avinu truly knew loneliness…..and HaKodesh Baruch Hu never promised us an easy road – just to keep walking. Honestly though, with the High Holidays approaching……….maybe I’m to move to another city……..another move, and another and another……
Be strong – for our only refuge is in Him.
Best always,
Julie (Rachel)
jcw58@hotmail.com
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