Lonely, Miserable, Pregnant: and totally hilariousAndrea Askowitz has the best life in the world.  She's pregnant and healthy.  She has friends and family who love her.  She has money and meaningful work.  And all she can do is obsess about the one thing she doesn't have: Kate, her ex-girlfriend.  My Miserable, Lonely, Lesbian Pregnancy is a funny, whiny, all-too-real account of one girl's true adventure in maternity.  

In week 8, her sense of smell becomes so strong that she can tell what deodorant people are wearing.  In week 28, she plans a pity party, complete with black-only dress code and a violin player: "It isn't an attempt to make fun of myself, because that would be too joyous."

Andrea's life reads like an antidote to sugar-sweet pregnancy guides and memoirs.  Irreverent and whip-smart, My Miserable, Lonely, Lesbian Pregnancy is potent therapy for ill-timed break-ups, leg cramps, constipation, and every other downside to a dream come true.

Over the past week, Andrea has bravely served as Jewcy's resident lonely, miserable lesbian (she's not pregnant anymore, but her partner is).  She's wondered about the possibility of having a hybrid baptism/bris, taught us that anyone can perform a baptism, searched for a baby name that will satisfy both her and her Latin lover, suggested that circumcision falls somewhere between ear piercing and foot binding, and finally admitted that she simply doesn't speak a lick of Red.  Check out her posts, join in the conversation, and pick up a copy of her hilarious book.

During the 1980s, Israeli filmmakers were preoccupied with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In the 1990s, they explored the dynamic between Israel's urban centers and the country's periphery. The past decade has witnessed a rise in films that seek to portray the experience of communities previously considered marginal to Israeli cinema. Avi Nesher's latest drama, The Secrets (Israel/France, 2007), joins a host of recent Israeli films, both feature-length and documentary, which explore Israel's ultra-orthodox community.

Ultra-orthodox Jews were mostly absent from Israeli filmmaking until the 1990s. This is no surprise, because Israeli cinema has historically reflected the identity of the Israeli establishment, promoting secularism and criticizing religion as a sign of ethno-nationalism rather than as a cultural facet of everyday life. From the late 1990s, however, the religious experience moved to the center of stage of Israeli cinema.

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Zeek's Editor-in-chief, Jo Ellen Green Kaiser, talks with Rabbi Rebecca Alpert about social justice, feminism and her book, Whose Torah?

Zeek: When people hear your name, Rabbi Rebecca Alpert, they tend to think, "Jewish feminist lesbian." Has that label been useful or helpful for you?

Rabbi Rebecca Alpert: All labels are problematic, but I don't mind taking on this label, and people do think of me that way - though they are often shocked that my current work is on Jews and baseball, or that my earlier work was on Reform rabbis developing an understanding of healing in the early part of the twentieth century. The label, though, was helpful back in the 1970s and 1980s when the idea of a lesbian rabbi was shocking. I was perfectly happy to stand up and confuse people.

Zeek: I was impressed to learn in your new book,Whose Torah, that you have deep experience in peace and poverty work.

RA: I do see feminism and gay rights work as part of a larger progressive agenda, both within the Jewish community and in the world at large. I have always understood feminism as being about more than just equal rights for women. Feminism opened my eyes so I realized that if you make life better for women, you make life better for everybody. Social justice is the grounding for the movement. Coming out of Reform Judaism, I believed social justice was the main way we Jews could make a contribution.

Zeek: How do you see social justice and spirituality connected within Judaism?

RA: I am very moved by Arthur Waskow's vision linking social justice to spirituality. That connection has not been the main impetus for me. The older I've gotten the more secular I've become, but I really see the importance of people seeing that there is a religious vision for social justice. There are so many people in the Jewish world today for whom spirituality is the center of their Jewishness: it's great when they make that connection to social justice.

Zeek: In your book, you frame Judaism as a kinship network as well as a spiritual source of faith. One element we lack in contemporary America is strong community, and you need strong community for justice work.

RA: I'm with you 100%. We see ourselves as Jews, fundamentally, as both a cultural network and a religious community. They are intertwined. That understanding that Jewishness is not only about spirituality throws people sometimes. People are surprised that religious people don't think you are any less a Jew because you are not spiritual. I am a post-Zionist, but I am always deeply moved by the Israeli world, the way they need to deal with the secular-religious connection. For instance being gay in secular Israel - as long as you are not in the chareidi camp - people say 'they are our brothers because they are Jews, they deserve rights.' Of course, it's a problem if our community is limited only to Jews.

Zeek: If the social justice impetus comes from Judaism as an ethnic tradition, why not just do social justice work from a purely secular position, or from another community that one is part of-for example, you talk about African-American Jews, Arab Jews. If you are a Jew with that kind of dual community, why not do social justice from an African-American position as opposed to a Jewish one?

RA: I guess it's the "as opposed to" that I don't agree with. People find a place from which they do their work. I don't think one place is better than another. I am a Reconstructionist Jew, which means I don't believe Jews are the chosen people. Every group has something to contribute. If doing the work from the Jewish perspective is meaningful, then great. If doing it from a different perspective is meaningful, then great. The connections are more important to me than the divisions.

Zeek: I can hear people saying, "Oy vey! This rabbi is saying we don't have to believe in God and we don't have to be Jewish just because Judaism is better, so why bother? Why bother learning Torah? It's too difficult! Why would anyone be Jewish! This will kill Judaism!" You must get this sometimes.

RA: I wish I was so powerful, that I singlehandedly could kill Judaism. I would have to be a bit careful about what I ever said to anybody.

Zeek: (laughs)

RA: Seriously, I don't do this because I believe in God or because it's the best way, but because it's my way. I see great wisdom and beauty and truth in Judaism. If I didn't find Judaism a tremendous source of wonderful ideas I wouldn't be a rabbi. I think Judaism holds up to rational scrutiny. It holds up to my questions. I feel I am in the tradition of Abraham arguing with God. You know, God in the Bible does not get along so well with the Jewish people, and the Jews didn't get along so well with God. There is always an argument, always questioning. That is the most wonderful part of the Judaism I grew up with.

God Doesn't Really Care Who You Do It With: as long as you do it with god Should gays and lesbians be ordained as Christian ministers and pastors? If Minnesota Presbyterians have anything to say about it, then yes, they should. Members of the the Presbytery of the Twin Cities recently voted to restore Paul Capetz's ordination as a "minister of word and sacrament." Capetz asked to be removed from the ministry eight years ago, after the American Presbyterian Church passsed a vote requiring that "ministers be married to a member of the opposite sex or remain celibate." As an openly gay man, that clearly excluded Capetz. Thanks to changes made to the Presbyterians' Book of Order in 2006, which now allows candidates for ordination to "declare a conscientious objection to church rules," Capetz is back in business.

Also in freethinking Minnesota, a Lutheran church recently ordained lesbian pastor Jennifer Nagel in what was called an “extraordinary ordination" because it was conducted outside of the ordinary guidelines for Lutheran ordinations, which "ban non-celibate LGBT people from serving as pastors."

In other good news for Godly gays, Lisa Larges, another Presbyterian who had previously been denied ordination due to her homosexuality, was recently approved by a San Francisco presbytery committee to "move along to other tests of qualifications." Opponents are preparing to challenge her progress, but Larges, who has sought ordination since 1985, is "proud of the decision by the committee."

Meanwhile, a columnist over at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer wonders if there might be "a refuge equidistant between the anti-gay Pastor Rev. Ken Hutcherson and the Christian bashing Dan Savage of The Stranger."