Shalom to all of you, Jews and Gentiles in our Rebbe Messiah Yeshua!
I am so happy to find this website and this community where I can meet others who share a love for Torah, Messiah Yeshua and His universal Church that brings together both Jews and Gentiles in the worship of our one God!
I am a Jew by birth, faith, education and practice. I embraced Yeshua our Messiah in college after reading the Gospel According to Matthew and C. S. Lewis' "Miracles." This lead me to explore the Evangelical and Messianic worlds, while remaining Torah observant. But all those issues raised in the well-written article https://www.catholicsforisrael.com/arti ... ic-judaism caused me to leave the Messianic Jewish movement and even Yeshua Himself! Even though I stayed friends with almost all my Messianics and Christian friends and even made new ones, I considered myself an ex-believer and searched for my truth in various forms of Judaism, including Zionist, Yeshivish, Sefardic and Chassidic, not to mention non-Orthodox Jewish denominations.
Well, God be praised for His faithfulness. 10 years later, after making Aliya to Israel, getting married and starting an observant Jewish family, I was lead to discover the Hebrew-Speaking Catholic Church right in the center of Jerusalem! Many circumstances came together, and this last Epiphany Day, Yeshua came back to my heart with power and love like He had the first time I believed at age 19! Over the next few weeks of contemplation and worship, and the incredible experience of the Eucharistic Presence, everything fell into place!
May Father God be praised for Yeshua, His precious Son, Miriam His Mother, the saints, the Eucharist, the liturgy, our Holy Father Francis, the consecrated religious, and the whole Apostolic and Catholic Church! Thank God that we, believing, observant Messianic Jews can finally have a place in the Church from the Circumcision and be in communion with the whole Body of Christ! Thank God that the Mother Church is finally repenting for the sins of the past towards her faithful and not-yet faithful Jewish children! Thank God for the blessed future that Jews and Gentiles can share together without losing our God-given differences! Thank God for our amazing present age of reconciliation and mutual love in preparation for the final Redemption of Messiah's glorious kingdom on a Heavenly Earth!
I am infinitely grateful to God that my husband is so supportive of my Catholic journey! He is an Israeli from a very hareidi background, but he too has been around Messianics for a long time, though he never became a believer. I would never have married someone who were against Yeshua in any way. My husband is so open and encouraging, though he is afraid for me to make my faith public lest we have negative backlash from the observant community we are part of, including our Chabad synagogue and our son's school. My spiritual mentors at the Catholic Kehila also tell me to protect my family's safety at all costs.
So I'm still very much a part of the Rabbinic Jewish world and have to keep my beliefs private on the Web as well. That's why I'm using a pseudonym on this site. But I fellowship with other Messianic Jews, especially those at the Bram Center (ministry of the FFOZ). And I feel more at home at the Catholic Kehila than I have ever felt anywhere else! I am in touch with David Moss of the Hebrew Catholics and with other observant Hebrew Catholics in Israel. Thank God I'm not alone! I still have so much to learn, as I follow the Catholic liturgical year, celebrate the saints, and attend Catholic Biblical classes. I am still in the beginning of my faith formation as I move toward eventual baptism in the Catholic Church. If it's really true that I can remain an observant Jew as a Catholic, then I'm so excited, I can hardly wait!
If anyone wants to contact me personally, the moderators have my email.
Blessings for a meaningful Lent and a powerful Passover season!
BatSion
Shalom from a newly Catholic Messianic Jew
Moderator: Moderators