Rabbi's Message 16th June 2010  

Short Clips:  Journeys of a Jewess’ Kippah
 
I’ve long been asked about my Kippot.  I’m less often asked about my tallitot and my tefillin, although an inverse emotional intensity usually accompanies queries about the latter two, these days.  Of course, when I began wearing a tallit, it raised plenty of eyebrows, because I was a “girl”.  In 1985, only one other woman had already been “on the fringe” enough to wear a tallit in our Conservative Shule in Southern California.  Now I’ve worn a tallit well over twenty years. Kippot and tallesim crown and embrace not only by Rabbis like myself, but even typical Bat Mitzvah girls in Progressive Temples, like ours in Perth.  But it is a different story out in the big world – and so the “Short Clips – Journeys of a Jewess’ Kippah” begin.
 
You never know what wearing a Kippah in public as a woman will lead to…but you can be sure something interesting is waiting, often in the most unlikely places!  A short time ago, I was in the airport on the way to the biannual meeting of Progressive Rabbis of the Australian-New Zealand-Asian World Union for Progressive Judaism.  Prior to departure, I took a moment to “powder my nose.”  As I walked away from the mirror in the “Ladies’” the woman at the sink next to me caught the reflection of the back of my head and said “I didn’t know women wore those…what-do-you-call-it?”  “A Kippah,” I replied, “Plenty of us do, especially since women were ordained nearly 40 years ago in Progressive Judaism.”  “Really!”  she exclaimed, “the Catholic Church could learn a lot from you!”
 
That’s interfaith dialogue moving ahead in the most unexpected places!