Seeing that title in print kind of makes me wish I had used it as my blog title or at least the byline. That is not the point of this post, however. In case you don't live in New York, Miami, California, DC, Chicago, or any of the other 3 places where Jews live in this country, you may not be aware but today is Yom Kippur. Actually, it starts tonight with a fun-filled long ass service and continues tomorrow with another long ass service. Just to make it an extra great holiday, you are supposed to fast from sundown today until sundown tomorrow. If you can't tell, I do not like this "holiday." In fact, I don't like any Jewish holidays.
Ever since I have had a choice in the matter (when I went to college), I have not "celebrated" the Jewish holidays. To be fair, most Jews don't celebrate any of the holidays except for Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. I just choose to keep it real. Hey, if you are not going to really follow this religion, go all the way with it. In a perfect world, every meal I eat would have bacon on it (by the way, we were driving in some ass backwards area of Virginia today and saw a sign for the most unkosher meal ever: a ham and oyster dinner).
Rosh Hashana is the celebration of the Jewish new year. Hell, I'm all for New Year's celebrations, but I prefer getting hammered and kissing someone (preferably female) at midnight, not having to put on a suit and "praying" while intermittantly standing up for uncomfortable periods of time. Furthermore, why the hell is New Year's a religious holiday for the Jews? There is nothing religious about it. Essentially, we're celebrating the great event of "tomorrow." So I have no qualms about skipping this holiday.
That brings us to Yom Kippur. As if all of us didn't have Jewish mothers, now we need to have a holiday devoted to making you feel bad about yourself? No thank you. This holiday is actually supposed to be the day of atonement, where you "atone" for your sins for the past year. So here's your heaping serving of guilt, served with a side dish of boredom, and a bowl of fasting for dessert. Whats more, you are expected to take off of work to go to services, because in America, the Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur are apparently not federal holidays. Screw you, Sandy Koufax. You ruined it for all of us non-observant Jews.
Here's the thing: I don't believe in organized religion. I'm sure it comforts some people, but mostly its used by a few in power to gain more power and/or cause destruction. I'm not saying that religions don't have their good aspects. If people actually followed the behavioral rules, the world would probably be a much better place, but usually those are even corrupted for political gain. I believe in Truth.
What the Jewish religion needs is some good PR and event planning people. The Jews have produced some of the funniest and most talented entertainers in the world, but we don't have one good holiday? Come on, we can do better than that. You don't have to give me Christmas. I realize that its taken 2000 years to bring it up to its current levels (which, by the way, is just one notch above obnoxious). But give me a Halloween. Give me a St. Patrick's Day. Give me a Martin Luther King Day. Something where you don't go to services and instead have fun.
So to all those who may be angry at me for going to work instead of services tomorrow, I would argue that I am just being an orthodox agnostic, rather than a non-religous jew who goes to services twice a year.
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Praise Jesus!
