Destination Bat Mitzvah
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
|
because she hates flying and cant get the time off from the icu!
op, cant you just talk straight up to your brother. my brother and i can still call each other on all kinds of nonsense. just tell him the truth about why it wont work for you and how terrible you feel. you might also mention that its a stupid idea to expect a lot of people to make the trip in tbe first place. |
Anonymous
| At the same time, it is wonderful |
Anonymous
| +++1,000,000. I hate destination ANYTHING. It's an enormous imposition to put on another family. I've done three of them (weddings) and will never do another. The cost, the travel, the stress, the work issues, the dresses or suits, the sheer hassle of it all is mind-boggling. No, I don't want to spent $15,000 to fly my family out to Napa and pay to stay at a posh Inn for your destination wedding. I don't and won't. Have your wedding there and your party here if you want family and friends to come. The BM events are out of control as it is (poop or no). Rabbis are trying to get parents to rein in the madness. This is just another extreme example. I know families who have eschewed the whole BM party madness and instead took their child on a tour of Israel. Just the immediate family. XLNT idea! Bonding experience for the family. Great photos. More spiritual. Long living memories. Much better to spend $100K on an extended family trip to Israel than an enormous theme party at a local Marriott. |
Anonymous
| Is BM a celebration of materialism? |
Anonymous
| Doesn't really go with the idea that your child can now stand up and be counted as part of the COMMUNITY. |
Anonymous
Not for us. Ours was a celebration of our son's coming of age, and reading from the torah. Yeah, I fed a lot of people lunch, but heck, they came out for a 150 minute service. |
Anonymous
Well, if you want to be technical about it, the ceremony was designed only to celebrate the young man's presence as the part of a community of MALES called a minyan. The bar mitzvah was to celebrate that the young man now counted as one of the ten male adults necessary to hold a minyan. Without a minyan, you could not commence communal worship. After the diaspora, Jews relied on pulling together a minyan of males wherever they could, so services could commence. But it was part of the notion of a floating tabernacle -- The Synagogue or Shul was not what made the community; it was the gathering of the community wherever it could, whether that be under the shelter of a chuppah, in the shtetls of Poland, in the concentration camps. What better way to celebrate a young woman's or man's mitzvah by going to the wailing wall?". Bar and Bat Mitzvahs happen there daily . . . with just nine other males participating. Sometimes total strangers who are, of course, also Jewish and have made the trek to pray and insert prayers into the chipped grout between the remaining blocks of the original Temple. What a splendid way to emphasize the importance of finding faith in a religion ever on the move. I can't think of a better way of symbolizing being counted as part of the COMMUNITY. You see this powerful statement at the end of "Fiddler on the Roof" - ten men standing together in the mud at the crossroads of their COMMUNITY ; their wives and carts behind them; each going in an unknown direction trying to find safety from the Russian pogroms. For the first time, the young married tailor is counted as part of the minyan. They pray, break up and go their separate ways - to Israel, America, Italy, Spain, France, Latin America, most likely never to be seen again - but wherever they go, if they could find nine other males, they could have COMMUNITY prayer. |
Anonymous
IMHO I definitely think it has become an excess display of materialism, wealth and "I-can-top-you". Have you ever seen the movie, "Keeping up with the Steins"? (hilarious). Here's what wikipedia says about it in its section on bar mitzvahs (I do hope you know there is no such thing for women in the Orthodox community because, historically, women didn't count towards the minyan needed to start COMMUNITY prayers): Bar mitzvah parties [edit] B'nai Mitzvah festivities typically include a seudat mitzvah a celebratory meal with family, friends, and members of the community. Others may celebrate in different ways such as taking the bar mitzvah on a special trip or organizing some special event in the celebrant's honor. In many communities, the celebrant is given a certificate. The main idea according to the Orthodox view is that this boy or girl is so happy that they are now commanded to do mitzvah and now they will earn reward in the next world for their efforts, that they throw a party and have a festive meal. Bar and Bat Mitzvah parties in America are often lavish affairs held at hotels and country clubs with hundreds of guests.[5][6][7] The trend has been mocked, most notably in the movie Keeping Up With The Steins. Rabbi Shmuley Boteach says that over-the-top bar mitzvah parties were already common when he was growing up in Miami in the 1970s.[8] The most vulgar Baht Mitzvahs I have been to were in Florida. Save-the-date cards. Lavish photo invitations. Hundreds of thousands of dollars for a "themed" dinner. Rock band. Others have been in New York City with lavish dinner and dancing in the restaurant at the top of the World Trade Center (sigh). Maryland ones (and I've been to many) seem to be a competition which parent can pay more and invite over 1,000 people. The Virginia ones I have been to were tasteful - but that's only two. I can understand why the more Conservative and some of the Reformed rabbis are worked up about this: a much better mitzvah would be to donate all that money to a good charity. This isn't even an issue in the Orthodox community because it is still treated as a sacred event. And women aren't allowed a Baht Mitzvah at all. |
Anonymous
Wow, we are stereotype everyone with the 2 (TWO) that you've been to. I think the majority of the ones we have been to (and we have been to at least 70 over the past 10 years) are nice parties with a DJ and some catered food. We have been to some that were over the top with people who were absolutely trying to impress, but that is far from the norm. Also, my son (and most of his friends that I know) not only donated a significant portion (25% of my son's he donated to charity) of whatever they were gifted by people, but many of the kids do mitzvah projects as well. And women ARE allowed to have a Bat Mitzvah, they simply are not allowed to read from the Torah during services which include males (and not on Shabbat morning). |
Anonymous
| We only have a toddler, but have discussed the idea of the Israel bar mitzvah. We assume no one may choose to attend, and that's ok. Perhaps the local synagogue would allow upon our return the boy to do a reading and host a kiddish for family and friends. Part of a destination affair, wedding, bar mitzvah, anything, is that it is just about the guest of honor and if you plan it that way you have to accept it. |
takoma
Member Offline
Member Offline
| Isn't a bat mitzvah what Jewish ballplayers call a home run? |