What, me Jewish?

Madeleine Albright's discovery of her Jewish roots brought back how I discovered my own Jewish roots, which I should have realized earlier but did not.

My father, a devout Episcopalian, married my mother, an Irish Catholic, just before the Depression. Since he was over fifty when he married, he was not the typical parent - no sports or movies. We did go on walks and he lectured me on things I only half heard, which came back after his death to close the circle. He died when I was fourteen, and I realize now that I never knew him well.

When he was alive, I remember summer visitors from Europe cousins "with funny accents" - who would stay at a hotel and come for dinner. They shook hands with the children as we gratefully retreated to our rooms. After my father's death, there was little contact with his family. We became much poorer and moved to the Flatbush section of Brooklyn, to be absorbed by Irish-Catholic culture. Part of this culture was an irrational anticommunism that spilled over into anti-Semitism and took seriously pre-Vatican II Good Friday prayers for "the perfidious Jews."

In those years, Flatbush was divided between Catholics and Jews, without much interaction. Most Catholics went to parish grammar schools and Catholic high schools. It seemed to me that Jewish children did well academically, played instruments, and went to museums. The Irish Catholics did sports, and at eighteen began to frequent bars, which became the center of social activity.

I absorbed much of the anti-Semitism that was implied in local Brooklyn church teaching. We read The Merchant of Venice in sophomore year, and, of course, Shylock was presented to us as the villain. The teacher reminded us that even contemporary Jews shared some of the same characteristics. Resentment in Brooklyn was intensified by the establishment of the Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC), which prevented discrimination in hiring. There were inflammatory editorials in the diocesan paper, The Tablet, which informed readers that FEPC was pushed through with Jewish influence. What we didn't realize at the time was that it also put an end to the "No Irish Need Apply" syndrome in many upscale banks and brokerage houses on Wall Street.

Somehow I made it through two years of college with my anti-Semitism intact when I received a rude shock from one of my aunts. After I had made an offensive anti-Semitic remark, she sat me down and lectured me on prejudice, hitting me between the eyes with the revelation that my paternal grandmother, who was dead long before I was born, was Jewish. My ancestors had come to this country from Germany after the political upheavals of 1848, had changed their family names, and had down-played their religious affiliation. My father - being naturally religious as an adolescent - joined a Presbyterian congregation and essentially "passed" because of his English surname. He was successful to the extent that he was admitted to Princeton. At that time, the university accepted neither Catholics nor Jews as a matter of policy.

Fortunately, my shock turned to laughter when I realized the absurdity of prejudice and remembered remarks I had heard during walks with my father. But it took me several more years to realize that the European relatives who used to come to New York had probably perished in the concentration camps, and the details of my father's Jewish family were only filled out some years later by a cousin.

As a youngster, I never connected with my parents' conversations that didn't pertain directly to me. It happens with most young people who are totally involved in their own lives. Even though some of my classmates used to taunt me by calling me a Jew because of my first name, it took something more direct to bring it home to me.

I was raised as a Catholic and thoroughly indoctrinated in the church's teaching and practices. I sang with the Paulist Choristers, so that good aesthetics in worship and liturgy reinforced my faith. When the church was criticized, I remember the rebuttal that "no other institution could have survived with such bad priests and popes. That is exactly what has made it so special."

I can certainly understand that Secretary Albright did not completely connect with her Jewish roots. They were probably dimly perceived and at the periphery of her consciousness. Consequently, there was no need to dig more deeply to uncover them. Had I not been lectured by my aunt, I might never have known and might still be scarred by intolerance.

As it happens, I have been greatly enriched by the knowledge of my Jewish roots and it has prompted further study. I am thoroughly embarrassed by my former anti-Semitism, and the fact that it can still surface in unguarded moments. Last year, my youngest daughter was married at home in a ceremony witnessed by a priest and a rabbi. It was almost as if my life had come full circle as friends remarked how deeply moved they had been by the fusion of two ancient traditions.

Aaron W. Godfrey lectures in classics and comparative studies at the State University of New York at Stony Brook.