Welcome to another episode of the Interfaiths
programming here at FIU. We are very honored
to have Joanne and Susan that are here from Temple
Beth Am. They're very esteemed colleagues and
they've been part of our Jewish Muslim small
dialogue group and they are pillars in their
own right of the Florida Jewish community and
they have a strong interest in interfaith work.
So what we'll do is we'll explore a little bit
about their background and talk about the work
that they're doing both with the community and
their larger hopes and aspirations for the meaning
of this interfaith work in this very challenging
time that we're living through right now. So
I'll start off with Joanne. Well, first of all,
thank you for inviting us to participate in this.
I'm currently the chair now of Unbiased, which
is our anti -Semitism initiative at Temple Beth
Am. Susan is on the board, the committee with
the rest of us, and we've been working for the
last three years on this initiative. We'll tell
you a little bit about my background, what brought
me to this kind of work within our synagogue.
I was born in Miami, raised in Miami, so it's
unusual to be a native and still here. I left
for a few years and came back, but I grew up
in a Miami that's very different from the Miami
of today. It was a small town. Everybody got
along. Our neighborhood was multicultural, different
religions. My elementary school and middle school
and high school, there were people of every faith,
every ethnicity. There were immigrant students
who started coming in the 60s. And I grew up
feeling like, yes, I am a Jewish girl, but I'm
also a human being. And that was sort of how
it was. We didn't feel different necessarily
except at Christmas time when our classrooms
had a Christmas tree and we all had to bring
an ornament. My mom wasn't quite sure where you
buy an ornament. So we got one and brought it.
And I always wanted one in my house, but I always
helped my friends down the street decorate their
Christmas trees. They came to my house and lit
the menorah. It was fine. I went to school in
high school. It was the first time that I was
in integrated high school. The schools in Miami
were forced integration, but in my area, it didn't
have to be forced. It was natural. People lived
there and lived and worked and studied together.
So I grew up feeling like interfaith work, it's
a word I didn't know what it really involved.
We all got along. We didn't talk about it. As
a matter of fact, reflecting... my three closest
lifelong friends who are still among my very
best friends that I met in elementary school
are not Jewish. And I didn't have close, close
friends who were Jewish until probably middle
school and high school when I got more involved
in the greater Miami Jewish clubs and social
things. I wound up becoming... nursery school
teacher and then a high school art teacher here
in Miami during the Marielle boat lift. So I
had students coming into Hialeah High School
every day, new students, and then I decided to
go to law school. And I went to the University
of Miami and upon graduation I was offered a
teaching position. So then I was a professor
at the law school for 30 years. Again, working
with all kinds of people. kept my faith very
close and personal. I didn't get involved in
the Jewish community and in Jewish outreach.
Instead, I brought my Jewish faith and my Jewish
values outward and became very involved in boards
in Miami and the Community Relations Board and
some other volunteer boards. And that work taught
me there was a lot I didn't know about different
people in different areas. I got quite ill, and
I had to stop working, and I had to stop doing
everything. And it gave me a number of years
to reflect on what did I really enjoy in my life,
if I ever felt well enough. And it was community
outreach and social justice work. And when Rabbi
Barris came up with the idea for this anti -Semitism
initiative, I said, that's it, I'm in. So that's
how I got involved. That's amazing. Yeah, I mean,
it's a wonderful. So do you feel that that has
also helped you in terms of what helped change
your private faith into something that you pursued
a bit more? Hmm. Probably getting sick. I wasn't
sure. In fact, I was pretty sure it was not going
to be okay. And I was. And it was a miracle.
And my rabbis were very comforting and very involved.
And I learned, I'm going to quote something I
heard the other night. One of our confirmands
at Temple Beth Am had written something. And
I'm going to take it for a moment, apply it.
She said, being Jewish means being part of a
strong, compassionate, kind, and caring community.
And that was when I felt it. I felt it because
people I didn't even know knew me reached out
and were very comforting and I began to feel
the personal faith along with the community faith.
That's amazing. Wonderful. So, Susan? Well...
I grew up for the first four years of my life
in upstate New York in a little town called Boston
Spa. And I grew up Jewishly. There was apparently
a large synagogue in Saratoga Springs right next
door. I was too young to really participate.
My family then moved to Miami. after that. And
it was a very challenging time. My father needed
to take his oral surgery boards again, and there
were quotas. And in fact, I found out that we
had changed our name so that he would be more
accepted in the community. And it came as a great
shock. It was very confusing to me. I thought,
wait a minute. Am I adopted? Am I part of this
family? How do I fit in? And I, unfortunately,
I had looked into some papers and that's how
I found it. What kids do when there are little
straw baskets. And then I didn't know how to
bring it up to my parents. I was kind of in a
deep, dark space for a bit and finally brought
it up. And they explained to me that when they
moved to this very tiny town at the time in upstate
New York, there were just four Jewish families.
And then when we moved here, that was the name
that they chose a name. And that was, it was
a family name. And so I then understood that.
When I came to Miami in the late 50s, early 60s,
there was a lot of racial tension and tension
for any minority group, which I didn't really
understand. And kind of just... went along with
my life in a public school. And then eventually
our schools went on strike and I had to go to
a private school. And fortunately, my parents
were able to send me. By then my father was settled
in his new profession that he had started over.
He had been a dentist and then went back to become
an oral surgeon. And there was tremendous racial
tension because he practiced in Hialeah. And
people there, couldn't afford the healthcare
they needed. And he would just take them as patients
and they would return it in services. It was
kind of like a barter system that I grew up around.
And that was my experience in high school. There
were private clubs and parties that I wasn't
invited to because I was, I identified proudly
as a Jewish woman. And went through college and
graduate school away from Miami. Got graduate
degrees in counseling education and then in social
work. And really worked in a social action area,
working with mostly in a medical setting, but
with minorities, for which I was the minority.
And that was all fine. Prior to that, I married
someone who was not Jewish, which really was
uncomfortable for my mother. My father passed
away when I was 17. He caught hepatitis from
a patient. Didn't know he had it. They didn't
glove in those days. And he didn't know he had
it or thought he had something else like the
flu. I met my husband in college and we got married
a week after college. Actually, yesterday was
our 50th anniversary, our 50th wedding anniversary.
Who did that then? I mean, and I think my mother
was just happy to get rid of me. And my husband's
family were Episcopalian and our rabbi here.
My husband thought he would convert, and then
at the 11th hour, chose not to. He just didn't
feel that that was where he wanted to be. And
a very prominent rabbi in Miami said, you know
what, I'm going to... put my bets with these
two and that they're going to, you know, raise
a Jewish family. And we did. And at 50, he chose
Judaism, which came as a complete surprise to
the entire family. You know, my younger daughter
at the time said, you know, put her hand on her
hip and went to school and said, just because
he chose Judaism doesn't mean that we have to
give up the tree. It was all very interesting
while we were at Temple Beth Am. And I slowly
got involved with interfaith families, young
couples, and with parents and grandparents whose
children had interfaith marriages. And I got
involved in, I actually went for training up
into Cincinnati to Hebrew Union College and would
help run the... classes, introduction to Judaism,
and I would do the psychoeducational parts with
another colleague who had gone for training.
And then we started working with parents and
grandparents. And I was quite surprised when
my husband chose Judaism. I just thought, we're
an interfaith family. That was my identity. But
the truth is, is that from a very early age,
and I think I shared this with you, there was
a life book. called The World's Great Religions.
And I was in love with this book, so much so
that my parents had to find it because the library
copy was getting checked out too much. And that
really stimulated my interest in learning about
people. And I saw it as layering when people
either chose to stay in their religion and just
learn more about another, or they chose Judaism,
that they didn't have to give up who they were
and what they thought. It was an opportunity
to grow and to layer. And that has basically
been my motivation. for this kind of work. I'm
very interested in learning about people. My
background is in counseling, and I learned so
much in having these relationships and listening.
And that was the real motivator for me, and particularly
in a world now that seems to thrive, unfortunately,
on hate, and in particular, anti -Semitism. I
feel the need to contribute in whatever way I
can to learn more about others and have others
learn more about me and about what I'm all about
and what I value. And my guess is, and what I
found out, it's not even a guess, is that we
share so much in common. So let me go back to
Joanne. I think talking about this idea, this
is a really important idea of antisemitism. That
is something that has become much more apparent,
I think, in the last few years, this rise in
anti -Semitism. I know that MBIAS is specifically
focused on anti -Semitism. Can you talk to us
a little bit about what you see in terms of that
experience and what has that been like to see
an increase in anti -Semitism and what do you
think is driving it? What has it been like? It's
been very heartbreaking, first of all, because
there was a time when hatred and anti -anybody
was under the radar, under the rug a bit. And
in the last eight years, well, no, more, people
have become comfortable expressing hatred. and
that's led to more hatred and that has led to
violence. There's been a history of anti -Semitism
for thousands and thousands of years and the
Jews have typically been the ones that are identified
when somebody has to say it's because of the
other. That's why things are the way they are.
And so that's not new. What's new is... The feeling
that it's okay to be like that. That it used
to be embarrassing to share that you hated other
people because of who they are or what they believed
or what they look like. You kept it quiet. Now
it's just out there and it's all over the social
media and it's being fomented into action and
violence. There used to be a theory that one...
teaches in law school and learns in law school
about free speech. You can have the freest of
speech in the whole wide world, but you cannot
scream fire in a crowded movie theater because
people will trample each other and that leads
to violence and that leads to action. So free
speech is fine until it begins to hurt people.
So the speech that we're hearing, the hate -filled
speech and the anti -Jewish, anti -Israel, anti
-Zionism, is not just a feeling. It's actually
a call to people coming to action, and that's
terrifying. People have been dying, yeah. People
have been dying. Relationships have been hurt.
People have begun to hate their neighbors and
their friends. cohorts and political divisions
because of that and it's also islamophobia and
lgbtq plus hatred and bigotry and racism anytime
somebody seems other yeah and i'm not going to
get into politics but i will say the leaders
in the world and in the community have an obligation
to tamp it down instead of fan the flames and
I'm afraid that it's going to get worse before
we figure out ways to make it better. So what
is, I know you don't represent the entire Jewish
community of Miami, but what is Temple Bet Sam's
role in trying to to challenge sort of this hatred?
We decided when Unbiased got started, this was
before October 7th. Things changed a lot since
then. So I'm going to go back to our initial
charge. We came up with the name, and our marketing
department was fabulous in coming up with the
name. You'll notice the U -N is small letters.
B -I -A -S, Bias, Caps, and E -D. It's Understanding.
and educating about bias. That's how that came
about. And so we remain committed to that goal.
Our mission is to educate and bring awareness
to hatred and anti -Semitism through programming,
through conversations, through education, but
also a big, big part of that with unbiased is
we want to be allies to others and consequently
gain allies in our struggle for fairness and
for peaceful resolution of difference and And
I just put a plug in for our small group dialogues,
which I was co -chair with Joe Jacoby. And I
said, I feel very, very strongly the way you.
get allies and get to know people as you look
them in the eye and you have a conversation and
you get to know one another. So I'm going to
take this opportunity to thank you, Iqbal, for
you and I met a couple of years ago. We both
expressed interest in the other's work and it's
developed into not just a working academic. relationship,
but we've all become friends in our group. We
trust one another, and we feel comfortable having
difficult conversations about differences, and
that is a true gift. Absolutely. Susan, I'll
maybe let you have the last word, but what has
your experience been like with the small group
dialogue, and what are your hopes for the future?
I have truly enjoyed the small group dialogues.
Thank you very much. Really, it's been interesting.
It's been thought -provoking. It's been emotional.
There are certainly triggers that have come out.
Mostly what I hope for is an ongoing relationship
and getting to know You and getting to know the
other members of the group more intimately. I
think there's a lot to be gained by that. We
have the trust where we are starting to talk.
I certainly don't have expectations that our
experiences are going to have been the same or
that we'll necessarily see eye to eye. But I
do hope for deeper understanding and compassion
and caring for one another. And I hope that that
can also allow us to feel really confident in
ourselves as a group to be able to go out and
continue that process and just allow it to grow
and to flourish and to not... to be okay with
being uncomfortable. Because that's how we all
grow. The wobble is what's so important. And
for me, I am looking for opportunities to learn
more and to grow and to further my valuable relationships
with people. Thank you so much. Can I add one
last thing? Sure. Thank you. I watched some of
your other podcasts, and I just want to add this.
If others are thinking about doing this interfaith
work or interfaith dialogue, I would encourage
you to always start with food. Agreed. We like
it. It's an icebreaker. You eat together. You
talk together about what foods you like. really
listen to one another. We all have stories we
want to share but it's really important to really
listen and understand where the other person
is coming from and what their life experience
up until this moment has been that brought them
to this point in feeling the way they feel. Absolutely,
yeah. No, I mean I think for me especially it's
been very illuminating to be able to understand
like a Jewish perspective. And especially understanding
sort of anti -Semitism and sort of the challenges
of October 7th, I think, from a Jewish perspective.
And on a personal level, it's been really wonderful
to see how you've embraced me and my family as
well. So especially, you know, my young son.
And sometimes I have caregiving duties, so I
have to take him everywhere. And you guys have
been so hospitable and so kind. And that's just
been, that means a lot to me. So I really appreciate
that. That's been a pleasure. Yes. So I think
what we can do is in the fall, then we continue
with, I think, going through our experiences,
kind of our Muslim background and Muslim perspectives.
And I think even having Zafreen talk, I think,
would be very interesting because her experience
living and growing up in Pakistan and coming
to the United States. And I think that there's
just so much there in terms of thinking about.
What does it mean to encounter diversity? And
the way that Jews are seen in Pakistan is completely
different. And kind of what work can be done
in terms of anti -Semitism globally, I think
that's a whole other discussion as well. Oh,
wow. Yes. Absolutely. Yes. Look forward to that.
Well, thank you guys so much for coming and for
allowing yourselves to be interviewed. I learned
a lot, and we'll continue the conversation for
sure. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you.
Thank you.