Laura Schlessinger has ceased to be an observant Orthodox Jew, according to an announcement she made on her show last month.
In a shocking if little-noticed revelation, Schlessinger — who very publicly converted to Judaism five years ago — opened “The Dr. Laura Schlessinger Program” on August 5 with the confession that she will no longer practice Judaism. Although Schlessinger said she still “considers” herself Jewish, “My identifying with this entity and my fulfilling the rituals, etc., of the entity — that has ended.”
What’s particularly … disturbing? irritating? … about the announcement is the basis for it.
Schlessinger began her August 5 program by noting that, prior to each broadcast, she spends an hour reading faxes from fans and listeners. “By and large the faxes from Christians have been very loving, very supportive,” she said. “From my own religion, I have either gotten nothing, which is 99% of it, or two of the nastiest letters I have gotten in a long time. I guess that’s my point — I don’t get much back. Not much warmth coming back.”
Schlessinger even hinted at a possible turn to Christianity — a move that, radio insiders say, would elevate her career far beyond the 300 stations that currently syndicate her show. “I have envied all my Christian friends who really, universally, deeply feel loved by God,” she said. “They use the name Jesus when they refer to God… that was a mystery, being connected to God.”
In her 25 years on radio, Schlessinger said she was moved “time and time again” by listeners who wrote and described that they had “joined a church, felt loved by God and that was my anchor.”
[…] Of her conversion to Judaism, Schlessinger said, “I felt that I was putting out a tremendous amount toward that mission, that end, and not feeling return, not feeling connected, not feeling that inspired. Trust me, I’ve talked to rabbis, I’ve read, I’ve prayed, I’ve agonized and I came to this place anyway — which is not exactly back to the beginning, but more in that direction than not.”
In other words, she’s decided to back away from a holy commitment she made because she feels unfulfilled, because she’s not getting back the love she expected, from God or her co-religionists.
I wonder what Dr. Laura would say about that if a caller contacted her with that tale of woe?
Yeah … “disappointing” and “irritating” just about sum it up.
I listen to Dr. L. sometimes on the drive home on Fridays. While she’s sometimes blindingly black-and-white in her thinking, I’ve tended to find her no-nonsense insistence on keep your commitments and don’t use your feelings as an all-trumping excuse to be refreshing. To basically have her be unable to live up to that in her own life (and, evidently, not see that herself) is pretty sad.
(via Volokh/Bernstein)
Aren’t you amazed that people still call into her show? Her “frankness” can be a little cold at times and tends to put me off of the message she is trying to relay. I’m surprised that more of the callers don’t just explode and start hurling four letter words at her.
Well, aside from what screening is done for her calls …
The thing I notice most about Dr Laura’s callers is that they almost always know the answer ahead of time. They know the right thing to do. What they want is someone to tell them that they can do the wrong thing, or else they want someone to give them some moral backbone to do the right thing that they don’t want to really do.
The people who call her want to be directed. She does so –sometimes a bit callously, to be sure — and in so doing, gives them what they want.
That said, I can only listen to her about 20 minutes before changing channels. (The same tends to be true for most talk show folks, give or take fifteen minutes or so.)
What I found interesting is the number of Christians that asked her for what amounted to theological advise. I heard the comment about Christians on her show. She was talking to woman who could not accept love from either God or humans. The woman on the call happened to be a Christian and Dr. Laura remarked how the Christians she knew could experience emotionally the love of God. She then stated that she envied that experience. I may be a little too naive here but it may be what Paul talks about in Romans 11:11
Again I ask: Did they stumble so as to fall beyond recovery? Not at all! Rather, because of their transgression, salvation has come to the Gentiles to make Israel envious.
She certainly is educated in both Christian and Jewish theological concepts, at least as a lay person, and, yes, she was able to apply that when religion came up.
Let’s remember that it’s the journey that is important, not the destination. Many believers never questions the set of beliefs that they were given in childhood, and get by just fine it life. But many, myself included, constantly move along the road of life, a journey that can be an up and down road to say the least. Pat answers and familiar homiliys are often not enough for a certain percentage of believers.
This woman publically admitted to having a crisis of faith, one that has left here unsure of the way to go. Are you willing to share like problems with your closest friends, let alone millions of strangers?
And I agree that many who call her are looking for someone to back them into doing the right thing. The real question is why do these folks need to be pushed in the correct direction? Why do they question what they know is correct? I have a little voice in my head that points me in the right direction. It’s my conscience (not Jimeny Cricket, by Emily Oswell, my grandmother, reminding me of what I should do).
I don’t have any problem with Dr. L moving along to a different part of her spiritual journey. Indeed, I encourage her (and anyone else) to do so as they find the need.
My problem is that her reasons for doing so, as reported in the article (I’ve not been able to get to her site to get any more direct notes on it), seem both shallow and, more importantly, fly in the face of what she’s been hammering people over the head about on the radio for years — after making a religious commitment, she’s backed away from it (not to anything, but away from it) because, among other reasons, she’s evidently not getting a lot of support from other Jews, and she’s not feeling the buzz and thrill she expected from it.
Perhaps that’s why she got into it, but I suspect that if someone were to have called her with just that problem, or with an analogous one (“I’m not in love with my husband any more, and my in-laws are cold and distant”) she would have rhetorically rapped them on the knuckles and sent them on their way.
I dunno. I guess an equally important question is how this experience shapes her future advice, and where she goes from here.
I think it’s great that Dr.L admitted her crisis of faith openly-it seems,at first glance, like that would take guts-or maybe not? I mean-maybe Dr.L craves the attention-getting she will derive from sll her devotees who will sympathize and commisurate with her on “the callous Jews”–she is a Talk-Show Host
after all-and they thrive on attention and hype, right? .