Daily Excerpt: Since Sinai (Gonyou) - Chapter 1, 2
Book Excerpt from Since Sinai by Shannon Gonyou (currently in Amazon Top 100 Jewish biographies)
CHAPTER 1 (continued from May 1, 2025)
Also in law
school, Travis had spent every weekend during the summer driving back and forth
from his summer job in Detroit to our apartment in Chicago. In the fall, my
fellowship ended, and I started a career in the litigation department of a
large law firm, notorious for being demanding and high-pressure. I therefore devoted
a lot of time to making a good impression.
Travis continued
on to his last year of law school. We tried to keep up with a number of
hobbies, from competitive fencing to learning Italian. We both got up early
every day[BL1]
to hit the gym and stayed up late to work and study. We were also practicing
Catholics. Obligations and activities filled our lives to bursting. So why, I’m
sure Travis was wondering, would I complicate the life we had created by
suggesting that we become Jewish? That question—why would I decide to become
Jewish—is this book’s raison d'être[BL2] .
“We could wait,” I
conceded. “I know the timing feels awful. I know how busy we are. Yet, I can’t
stop thinking about it, and you know how I get when an idea takes hold. I’ve
held my tongue for as long as possible. I don’t want to throw our lives into
upheaval. I wouldn’t be saying anything if it weren’t burning me up inside.”
“It’s Christmas
Eve!” Travis sighed. “And converting from Catholicism to Judaism is most
certainly an upheaval. What made you even think of this?”
“Well …” I glanced
at our digital clock, its red numbers glowing aggressively. I didn’t have much
time to explain. We would be late to dinner. And in any case, it seemed
impossible to explain.
A month prior to
this poorly executed car ambush, I had stumbled across a “Jews by Choice”
conversion program at Anshe Emet, a Conservative synagogue less than a mile
from our apartment in Chicago.
“Stumbled” might
be a disingenuous term. It was no accident that I was spending my limited spare
time Googling “how to convert to Judaism?” or “how to know if you should be
Jewish?” or “are converts accepted as Jews?” I’m pretty sure that the course
came up when I Googled some variation of “become a Jew in Chicago.” You can
truly find anything on the internet.
Apparently, Chicago
had so many aspiring Jewish converts that classes were offered at multiple
synagogues in the city and suburbs. Given this much interest, maybe the idea of
converting wasn’t so far-fetched, after all. I downloaded the course schedule
for Anshe Emet’s program, the closest one to where we lived in the city. The
program was divided into fall and winter semesters, making January an ideal
time to start—the short answer to why we were discussing a major religious
identity shift on a Christian holiday.
“I get that you
want to take the class,” Travis said when I told him about my incessant
Googling, “But I still don’t know why we have to become Jewish. Isn’t it enough
to learn about Judaism?”
“I don’t think it
will be enough for me to learn from a distance,” I explained.
“Why?” he asked.
He had to turn down the Christmas music in order to focus on what I was saying.
It is hard to make a case for Judaism with “Frosty the Snowman” playing in the
background, so I appreciated that.
“I don’t feel at
home in Catholicism,” I said, “I’m increasingly uneasy about trying to make a
home for our future children there. I have doubts about Jesus dying on the
cross to save us because I don’t think we needed to be saved, at least not in
the way that Christianity teaches. I admire Jesus’ teachings, but I’m growing
uncomfortable with the human sacrifice narrative.”
“Those are
significant developments,” he admitted uneasily.
“I don’t see the
merits of using a priest as a sort of conduit between God and myself,” I
continued. “The Christian concept of the afterlife doesn’t comfort me like it
should. And I don’t feel anything when I take communion. I’m acting out the
role of a Catholic, but I’m not feeling what I want to feel in my spiritual
life.”
Raised in a heavily Catholic suburb of Detroit, Michigan, Shannon grew up focusing on two things: how to do enough good deeds to get into heaven and how to stay pure enough to escape hell. In college, she followed many of her peers into an Evangelical church known for guitars, drum, religious-based shame, and the idea that without Jesus she was nothing.
But when she encountered Judaism on that same campus, a spark ignited within her and refused to be put out. Judaism felt obvious, familiar. After a falling out with her biological mother and two miscarriages, she found the courage to send the most important email of her life: she asked the local Jews by Choice program to accept her as a student.
Honest and unflinching, Shannon's story of coming home to Judaism encourages everyone-- Christian, atheist, Jewish, and anything in between-- to search relentlessly for the place where they belong.
Keywords
Jewish conversion story, Judaism for converts, Leaving Evangelical Christianity, Faith journey memoir, Religious identity, Interfaith experiences, Deconstructing Christianity, Finding spiritual belonging, Miscarriage and faith, Healing from religious shame, Jews by Choice, Catholic upbringing. Spiritual transformation, Women and faith, Religious trauma recovery, Personal journey to Judaism., Faith after loss, Spiritual resilience, Deconstructing Evangelical beliefs, Rediscovering faith
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