atame to mind, i was like, oh, steve urkel. (both laughing) good morning. welcome to "mosaic." i'm rabbi eric wise and honored to be your host this morning. the san francisco bay area's characterized in part by being a place that encourages and nourishes self-discovery. we would like to invite you into a wonderful conversation this morning with marnie hall and jim [ inaudible ] , who along the way of self- discovery, discovered you are jewish. welcome, marnie and jim. >> thank you for inviting us. >> how did you discover that you are jewish? >> when i was 30, you had grow up as a wasp and went to

episcopal church. my parents were long dead. my sister, who was much older, a generation older, 19 years older, she took me aside and said did you have any idea our family was jewish? and was absolutely gob smacked. i had no idea. i thought it was a secret, but i thought the family was mexican. my mother was dark and she spoke spanish and came from texas. so, finding out that i was a st revelation. >> and jim? >> i was 54 and had been estranged from my mother. and reconnected with her. she said i have something very important to tell you. i don't want you to find out after i am dead. she said repeatedly you are jewish. you are jewish, you are jewish. and i finally said mom, if i'm

jewish, that means you're jewish. oh, no, dear, i never had any a finnity or affiliation with judeaism and i am not going to start now. and like marnie said, it was a revelation and in some ways, i felt like i had been waiting my whole life to hear this news. and the particular tonic plates were realigning. >> and for each of you, you each have a sense that you can say you should internal rumbling. a secret waiting, you know, for this revelation. i wonder if you can talk about what is that that was at work? terps of jewishness? >> well, it made me reflect on my history. and when i did, thought of certain episodes that were very startling and anomalous in my background. i remember there was a farm boy who, when he didn't get paid adequately by my family, he

said, you must all be jews and i went back and repeated that. i saw the consternation ripple through the family. i had no idea what that meant. i also had a baby book where everything fell out but there was one baptismal certificate stamped and glued in for eternity that would never fall out. and i put all of these. i started connecting dots and thinking, there were clues all along. there were dots. strange things. i came home from boarding school and told an anti-semitic joke and my brother who knew as my sister had, got so upset and never got upset with me. i thought back in my history, it was revealed in a whole different light. >> interesting and, jim, for you? >> for me, and the timing was interesting. i had written an essay called "at the museum of jewish heritage for this anthology" a coadmitted with my friend. called identity and the wanting

to be who we're not. and it was about identification. i wanted to be jewish. i lit the men orra, i went to concerts and went to high holiday services, the jewish film festival. my boyfriends were all jewish and it was look what is this b. so this piece had been written some years earlier and was published and a month later, my mother tells me this news. i am thinking oh, it's not just envy, i am, but it was something -- like on a cell color level. my body knew something that rek understand. >> in the jewish community, a lot of people who are born and raised jewish and then in the jewish culture have this sense of it's in our cells and community. in our bodies. and so we develop a certain

kind of embodiedness about being jewish and when woke hear people say things like i just knew it inside myself, i didn't quite know what it was, it got affirmed, it's a count of cultural queuing that i am sure you see. so part of a natural question ends up being, where -- do you know what a gap happened? do you know where there was a place where jewish identities stopped being overred and somehow got lost but known under the surface? do you know in any of your cases? your past family framework in that way? >> that is an interesting question. for my family, it goes way, way back. that were southern jews and a simulating before the -- assimilated before the civil war and had a running start on assimilation in a way. >> oh. and when my mother was born and grew up, he was determined not to be jewish and changed

the family story. >> ah. >> and determined because a lot of anti-semitism in texas and around nshs born, you can imagine. and i think what year saying is interesting in the sense that there were a lot of queues. azall kinds as i look back on it and i didn't understand. ef not around jews as i knew of. we were in the country, no jews or synagogue. nothing. there were all kinds of ways of being until wort, values and some food. all kinds of things that were really educational kind of value. and ethical sort of standards that i think were basically jewish. >> wonderful. we're going to take a quick break and come back to this conversation in just one moment on ""mosaic"."

. good morning. welcome back to the jose. we're in the mud -- to the ""mosaic"" we're in a conversation about how they respectively discovered they are jewish. welcome back, marnie and jim. >> hi. >> wonder talking about a little bit about your background and how you came to understand that you are jewish. i am wondering if you can share a little bit about once you discovered you were jewish, how, then, you came into the

jewish community and approached the jewish community, resources you used. how did you start out, jim? >> my first stop was the jewish community libraries jewish genealogical society meeting. i went with the very vague pieces of information my mother had given me and i tried to figure out if any of it was true or if there was documentation of anything and fairly quickly discovered that one of the searchers found my grandfather's world war i draft application, saying theodore burns and in parentheses, bernstein and we believed he was of scottish decent and that he was born in brooklyn. it turns out he was born in russia and emigrated in no one 06. so that was -- me mother had some confused pieces of that

and my grandmother, who was parisian, i knew well and her maiden name was simon and her mother's maiden name was david, david, and her mother's maiden nape was levy and it didn't get more jewish than that. both of my grandparents, that were closeted, flash and a simulated, and my mother believed they may not have known about each other's hidden jewish identity. >> fascinating. and marnie, for yourself? >> the first step was to go home to my lover and tell her i was a jew. that was my first. my lover was jewish. >> uh-huh. >> my lover freda. she said i always knew you had a yushakopf. >> a jewish mind. >> yeah. yeah. >> and that was my first stop

and i went back and found my relatives in texas. they had some -- i started communicating with them and they had a huge family reunion and brought in all of the cousins i never knew and went back. and southern jews are half is southern and had hospitality bags for everyone from out of town. it was an interesting hybrid of culture. >> what is a hospitality bag? >> you don't know. that is interesting. when you go, they pride themselves. southerners, on being hospitable. >> yes. >> and they had all kinds of gets, barbecue sauce and trots from texas inside. -- treats from texas inside. and all of the bags, the relatives who were from out of town for this reunion. it was a interesting history and they collected all of this archival material. i found out about the family history. they're very proud of it. the community for me, my community has to do with a lot

to do with my ancestors. i am proud of them and they started the first synagogue in often. and they are counsel to earth, you know, ethical people. and they were hardworking and smart and utterly -- they prospered in spot of anti- semitism in texas. >> it's interesting that you have come to. >> you dougha simp. -- judeaism with yourself and life experiences j. yes. >> i know it's a big question, talk about how you brought yourself to that point in time to judeaism. >> yeah. >> and how the jewish community influenced you from that point. >> go ahead. >> the first thing that is important, i had gone through a

self-revelation, which is -- i read a book in my 20s about gay u dentt and i had been with women before but i had not thought of myself as a lesbian. i had a dream that night. influenced by that book. i woke up and it was women in bars in new york. i had a dream about myself. i woke up a different person. i had already had this transformational experience about identity. i knew how mouthable identity -- mutable identity is and the same thing happened when i found out i was a jew. overnight, i found myself complete, like a hugely different person. everything of different about me. and i realized i was condescending towards jews who were my friends and lovers. i thought i had been superior and you didn't know that until i was jewish? >> interesting. believe it or not, we have to take a break. we're coming back in a moment

and continue this fascinating conversation with marnie and jim.

. good morning want welcome back to "mosaic." i am rabbi eric weiss. honored to be your host this morning. we're in the middle of a wonderful conversation with marnie and jim about how they discovered their jewishness. womtalking about the break, jim, and marnie was sharing how her own adulthood at a certain point when show discovered her influence and a sense of back and forth. what was it for you? >> somewhat similarly. i came out when i was 20 as a gay man. my identity kind of arranged or rearrange itself and this felt similar when my mother revealed this identity.

it was like oh, okay. so, i completely changed and was completely the same. and i took myself to synagogue thinking oh, well, may be now, i will find the services more meaningful and man now i will opinion the songs that i won't feel like an interloner. of course -- interloper. none of that changed. i had not grown up as a jew. i sort of like know it, i use the analogy of being transgender, a transgender person doesn't have the childhood of the gender they're now living. and so, i feel like i am not a pretend. >> i mean my mother's family was jewish. and i have done all of the lacks that beginning nurturing

parents jewishness. >> interesting. and you know, self-discovery oftentimes, not always, but oftentimes involves either revealing or breaking things that were before that moment's secret. and that can have its own domino effect. and so, both of you have talked about that the bit of an element in your families. i am wondering what effect this had more broadly on your family's of origin? and in what ways then really living as jews has really made it transparent and brought it to the fire? >> well, the first thing that was -- the fore? >> the first thing for me that was important as a counselor, i work with people's narratives all of the time. some are not helping certain people. what this did when i found myself to be such a chameleon and how it changed me, it empowered me in my work to take

a more hegemonic view of narratives and say i can help people change. look how i changed from the revelations and i can also help people change their narrative. it was very instruct of in my nscewnd influentia>> inthe wa. fathinat eveinryone atis g. dead, i have -- i mean all o the predecessors. i am the last. >> it's up to me to pass on the heritage. i have been doing my part. >> interesting and jim? >> well, it was interesting. was -- my mother was doling out cousins. i would call them and i got a family geneology that indicated that my grandfather's parents were not john and jenny burns of scotland, but jacob and velda burnstein and i called my brother and said isn't that interesting our great grandfather was jacob and you named your son jacob. and he was not interested at all. he said, jacob was named for someone in my wife's family. i said, yes, and that is a very

common name, don't you think that is an interesting lineage? and he was not engaging. i remember a dinner, a family dinner, my nephew, who was a teenager at the time said, well, jim, i don't understand how is it that you're jewish but dad's not jewish and grandma is not jewish? >> uh-huh. >> and i am looking over at my brother thinking how do i answer that? >> interesting. >> and that is how things have remained. >> in the family. whoever going to take another quick break and come back here on "mosaic." please join us in just a moment.

. good morning. welcome back to "mosaic." i'm rabbi eric weissen. we're in the middle of a wonderful conversation about discovering they are jewish with marnie paul and jim van buskirk. welcome back, jim and marnie. we are -- there is so much to talk about. i am wondering how the two of you met and if you can talk a little bit about is there a community of like folks out there in our jewish community? >> well, one of the ways that marijuanay and i, we had met,

but we reconnected when i remembered a wonderful novel by richard hall called "family fictions." and it was about a family who had, which had hidden its jewish identity. and i opened it up. it was dedicated to marnie. and i sent her an e may. i said, guess what? i think i am part of the tribe. and so, we sat down over lunch and started comparing notes. it was just this great connection. it really gave me solace and sense of community. and i remember her telling me about a bar mitva she held for herself. she said no, it was a bar mitzvah. so, talk about that -- . >> well, anyway, richard was my brother. so, he wrote a book about -- .

>> ah. >> it's a true book about a fiction. i mean a true northern california about a fiction, which is my family fiction. >> yes. >> say very interesting and complicated. >> yes. yes. interesting. >> yeah, so. >> and have you discovered folks like yourself who later in adulthood discovered they are, in fact, jewish? >> many. turns out it's a very, very common narrative. there have been lots of books about it. memoirs written. madeleine albright. we have been on panels called new jews of many people who have discovered as adults that they had have jewish heritage. >> and i am wondering as part of your, the ark of your nair television so far, how then do you begin to integrate-and make choices about jewishness and jew issue life to the life you already have? how do you understand jewish holidays? how do you understand jewish

approaches to biblical narrative? to jewish ethical values about being in the world? that sort of a thing? it's a big question. can you talk about what that is for you? >> for me, it's very much been an evolving process. where i pulled on one legging at a time of jewishness and then put something over my head. it was -- it's been years to the point where now i am so proud and hap to be a jew. and very open. but it's, it's been very gradual. and it's taken a lot of processing, investigation and historical searching on my part. >> huh. >> and i wonder also, i am sure this is true for both of you, but, jim, do you move through places where you start to relinquish christianity or relinquish things that you did that were not particularly jewish? is that part of the process? >> i don't think i have any christianity to relinquish. >> i see. >> one of my rabbi friends asked me, what religion were

you growing up? i said, tongue and cheek, we were devoutly unitarian. he just rolled his eyes. but i had a wonderful opportunity because coincidentally, the universe had provided, i was working at the jewish community library. so, i had resources to the staff to the collections, to people. job was to read books for the book club in a box program. all day every day, i was sitting and reading the experience and watching the form of variation and every geographical place. so, it was a crash course in judeaism. so, everything that i had not within taught as a young -- not been taught as a young person, was filling up the reservoir and understanding and having a particular perspective. as i said, i didn't have it to begin with.

but i was growing it. somehow the similar to what marnie indicated. >> fascinating. believe it or not, we have one minute left in our conversations. i am wondering for anyone who might be listening or know someone in their world, in your particular state of discovery, what is one thing you might suggest to someone who fines themselves discovering that they are, in fact, jewish and was previouslily known? >> i would say to celebrate that heritage. what a marvelous heritage. how lucky we are. >> wonderful. jim, what about you? >> i would echo that and to say, that we're not alone. there are lots of us. all over the world who, for one reason or another. >> yeah. >> have had to hide their heritage. and to embrace it. and celebrate it and find like- minded people. >> jim, marnie, thank you for sharing your story and thank you so much for joining us here on "mosaic" and we encourage you to self-discovery. have a wonderful day.

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call prigh so we can both respond out and keep the public safe. live from the cbs bay area studios, this is kpix 5 news. >> right now and streaming on cbs in the bay area, a deadly crash. we have the latest. people are rushing to get the booster shots as a dangerous new variant spreads. why is a massive vaccination site closing? we have details. >> this is a beautiful city, wonderful. i love the light. i love the people i met. >> i could not believe it. i was shocked