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Friday, May 07, 2021

These are critical conversations. We must talk about clergy who sexually abuse, and the people and institutions that cover for them...

 

Bimah at synagogue in Washington Heights by the Forward

Toxic leadership in the Jewish world goes beyond sexual misconduct. A reckoning must come.

 

We’re in the middle of yet another reckoning with abuse in the Jewish community.

The Forward reported last week that a former senior leader of the Reform movement had sexually assaulted members of his congregation and may have committed other acts of abuse and harassment — and that the Reform movement may have kept details of this misconduct from the public.

It’s likely that this news may be the first of many revelations across the Jewish world in the coming weeks and months, particularly as the Union for Reform Judaism launches an independent investigation into sexually inappropriate conduct that may have occurred under its watch.

These are critical conversations. We must talk about clergy who sexually abuse, and the people and institutions that cover for them.

But our grappling with the issues in Jewish sacred leadership cannot and must not end there.

Our conversations about healthy leadership, appropriate boundaries, appropriate modeling of spirituality and non-toxic theology cannot, and should not, begin and end with the question, “Is this person a sexual abuser?”

We also must talk about clergy who — even outside any context of sexual abuse — manipulate. Who gaslight. Who abuse the teacher-student power dynamic.

The clergy who blur emotionally necessary lines between themselves and those who rely on them for spiritual learning and guidance. This kind of fuzziness is a problem, regardless of whether or not it’s sexual.

The ones who let you in, just a little too much. Who don’t just encourage you to open up, but maybe push a little too far. Who say things like, “You can trust me!” “You’re really special, you know.” “I don’t want to play it safe.”

About the clergy who do that trick of staring into your eyes, deeply, to make you feel so seen — and then tell you what they want you to do.

The clergy who are energy vampires.

The ones who lower boundaries around touch — even if they never cross the line into legally-defined harassment or assault.

The ones who, even if they are not sexual abusers themselves, learned how to be clergy from abusers, have abusers as role models and pass on abusive approaches and tactics to their students.

The ones who will say things to you privately that they might deny having said in public.

The ones who offer what seems to be a narrative about spirituality, but is really a story about ego.

Whose Torah, sermons and teaching reflect a toxic worldview, one that doesn’t honor congregants’ agency, selfhood and intuition.

The clergy who teach that spirituality is all about warm, pleasant feelings, who do not help you to do the hard, painful work that a true spiritual practice also demands. This is a concept known as spiritual bypassing — defined concisely by Rabbi Rachel Barenblat as the wrongful use of “spirituality to justify avoidance of things that are painful or uncomfortable, like anger or conflict or boundaries.” Often, it comes hand-in-hand with an eliding of boundaries, a rush towards forgiveness without accountability, a denial of the need to speak difficult truths, a drive to pretend that situations are healthy or safe when, in fact, they may not be.

In many ways, it’s more difficult to talk about these behaviors, because they are less concrete than instances in which we can say, “This person said or did such-and-such specific thing.” And goodness knows getting to the place where we can name sexual abuse has not been simple work, and we’re not even fully there.

We are in no way done with reckoning with sexual abuse by clergy or the systemic overhaul now needed — and long needed — to address that abuse. Silence breakers are heroes.

And, at the same time, we must talk about these other clergy problems. I have seen all the above issues manifest in a single leader. I’ve also seen many leaders who do one or two of them.

Those who are in lay leadership need to learn to identify toxic leadership styles among clergy, and to meaningfully address them. Even if the leaders, and the toxic styles they use, can be inspiring. Even if they make you feel good.

And those of us who are clergy need to be honest in facing the question of how we may have blurred these lines ourselves.

When our egos have gotten a little too inflated by the work of teaching Torah.

When our own unhealed wounds or emotional needs have slipped into the driver’s seat, often without us even noticing.

When our burnout has prompted us to lean harder than we should on others to help pick up the slack.

What ideas have we absorbed about what holding space in ritual looks like? About how to touch people’s souls when preaching? About communicating compassion in pastoral counseling? About what our communal norms should be for creating connection?

Where did we learn those ways of doing and being? Who do those ideas serve? And who do they empower? What tools do we have to discern that?

We have barely begun to deal with the sexual predators in our midst; there are many more yet to be revealed, and many more still who will likely never be outed. We have not yet begun to identify the people who cause this other, non-sexual kind of boundary abuse, or even come up with a way to name it.

We must also ask these other questions, grapple with them, if we want our sacred spaces to be healthy, to truly serve God and our communities. This, too, is our work.

https://forward.com/opinion/468977/rabbis-sexual-misconduct-judaism-reform/

5 comments:

Professor Ryesky said...

My conjecture, to which I have yet to find any negation, is that every religious Jew who goes OTD has been invalidated by a rabbi, lied to by a rabbi, abused by a rabbi, or some functional equivalent thereof.

If there be any exceptions, please let me know.

Toronto Agudah Fresser said...

https://globalnews.ca/news/7636880/toronto-public-health-yeshiva-yesodei-hatorah-coronavirus/

Government keeps catching Yeshiva Yesodei Hatorah illegally opening

Toronto Agudah Fresser said...

Published just 3 hours ago

https://www.680news.com/2021/05/07/private-school-to-close-monday-after-toronto-issues-new-section-22-order/

Not just Yesodei, but multiple Fresser yeshivos have kept opening illegally, so the government is finally cracking down

the virus is raging out of control in Canada where almost no one is vaccinated

YTT Freak Show said...

https://www.linkedin.com/in/naftalischwartz

YU guy Naftali Schwartz was recently employed by Torah Temimah, but that lasted all of 2 months

https://www.jta.org/2021/05/07/ny/a-survivalist-summer-camp-for-orthodox-jews-is-planned-for-new-york-and-vaccinated-folks-arent-invited

the nut announced he's opening an anti-vaxx camp in Livingston Manor, which it's not clear how he'll be granted a NYS license

Philly gets Results said...

Effects of COVID not only stretch months but increase risk of death & chronic conditions, even in those never hospitalized, a large new study finds

In the journal Nature, researchers looked at 73,000+ Americans not hospitalized. 1-6 months post-infection, they had significantly greater risk of death — 60% higher — than the uninfected

The VA patient research also found nonhospitalized COVID survivors had 20% greater need for outpatient care in the 6 months over those sans COVID

COVID survivors experience vast long-term problems they never had before — not just lung issues from respiratory stress, but symptoms affecting virtually any organ / part of the body: neuro-, cardio- to gastrointestinal. They're also at great risk of mental health problems, ie anxiety & sleep disorders

“We found it all,” said Dr Ziyad al-Aly, R&D chief @ VA St Louis

“Shocking, like oh God, see the scale! Jarring”

More post-COVID: diabetes, kidney & heart problems, become chronic needing treatment the rest of their lives

“Continued respiratory disease, headache, this, that. The health system's not made to deal with it” said Dr Laurie Jacobs, internal medicine chair @ Hackensack U Hospital. “It’s not gone. We don’t understand the underlying cause. It’s chronic in some cases, disabling in others, some got better”

It's the largest study on a comprehensive array of conditions. Most of the 32+ million infected Americans weren't hospitalized, so it applies to a wide swath

Jacobs' clinic sees wide range of symptoms & said risk of death is much higher than expected. “I'm really shocked”

1-6 months post-mild infection, 1,672 of 73,345 patients died, the study reports

“100,000s have unrecognized syndrome & immune response, how the virus changes the response & how the response is in all organs,” said Dr Eleftherios Mylonakis, infectious disease chief @ Brown U’s Warren Alpert Med School & hospital. Often, he said, those with new symptoms but never acutely sick are confused, seek doctors who refer to specialists, each trying to figure out treatments in their specialty

“Patients lose. It makes other long COVID symptoms worse. Endocrinologists look at blood sugar, not 14 other systems. But the problem with blood sugar may be they're so weak & foggy they can't shop for healthy food, so they order pizza”

Mylonakis said the VA better handles specialists, but for outsiders, frustration-confusion adds huge stress aggravating symptoms

Still, complexity of long-term COVID's very evident in the VA, too

“Patients get out up 10 minutes but can’t eat when exhausted, so tired by the time they put a small salad together,” said al-Aly

COVID survivors are usually on a spectrum of medications for new emerged health problems, including opioids, which scares al-Aly as it may portend a future wave of addiction

Al-Aly + co-authors Yan Xie & Benjamin Bowe, both @ Washington U St Louis, also analyzed 13,654 patients hospitalized for initial infection. Unsurprisingly, the sickest patients in ICU were at greatest risk of long-term complications, followed by those in regular hospital wards, then patients never hospitalized

Yet, almost every symptom: chest pain, shortness of breath, diabetes to weak muscles, were experienced by some who were never hospitalized

“It’s everywhere. Even if you stay home & recover in 3-4 days. That’s important as that segment's the lion’s share of patients”

They have much greater risk of long-term complications than from flu, the study found. Persistent symptoms in a wide array beyond respiratory manifestation: neuro-, cognitive, psycho-, cardio-, metabolic, anemic & fatigue-malaise

Mylonakis & other experts note understanding of the virus evolves quickly. Some with long COVID got better over time

Still, al-Aly said: “We'll grapple for years to come, maybe even decades, with effect of the pandemic on long-term health of Americans. We were unprepared for COVID. Let’s not drop the ball on long COVID”