By David Raphael
The Baltimore home of Lee M. Hendler, co-founder and president of the Jewish Grandparents Network, is stately and beautifully designed. All is neat and in its place — except for the den where her grandchildren play. Bins of toys and stuffed animals, and stacks of boxed games arise from the floor, waiting to be explored and enjoyed.
In the Raphael home, the newly finished basement almost immediately became a play space for our grandchildren, even though they live 600 miles away and visit no more than two or three weeks a year.
These spaces in our homes are also spaces in our hearts, and they are a metaphor for our love for our grandchildren. We want our homes to be places where our grandchildren will have fun and find meaning. We want them always to feel welcome, no matter who they are or who they choose to become, the career they pursue, whom they select as their life partner, or by which pronoun they define themselves.
(Provided Photo)
We also strive to share with our grandchildren the Jewish life, values, and traditions that have so enriched our own lives. Through the years, we have learned that Judaism can elevate the most joyous of times and can comfort us when life is painful. Within our traditions, there are treasures waiting to be discovered, and these treasures can bring great meaning to our lives.
This is the worldview that the Jewish Grandparents Network aspires to share with those who join our community and participate in our activities. For instance, we welcome grandparents and family members to visit the Family Room on the Jewish Grandparents Network website, which is filled with adventures and resources such as: make family portraits out of objects from your junk drawer, learn how to tell great family stories, or learn of the 100 best children’s books to read to your grandkids.
Our research from the first national study of Jewish grandparents, “Jewish Grandparenting Today” (2019), reveals that not all grandparents feel fully at home in the world of Jewish practices and customs. Based on a segmentation analysis, 23 percent fall within the category we have termed “Secular.” These grandparents are among the least likely to describe themselves as religious or spiritual. Generally, these grandparents do not model Jewish behaviors for their grandchildren and family members. Because of their backgrounds, many of these grandparents do not feel comfortable or confident in making Judaism their own.
As the Jewish Grandparents Network seeks to engage and support grandparents as they embrace their roles as transmitters of Jewish traditions and values, our medium and message seeks to reflect Moses’s final words to the people of Israel: “It is not in the heavens, that you should say, ‘Who among us can go up to the heavens and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it.'” (Deuteronomy 30:12)
Lo Bashamayim Hi — “It is not in the heavens.” You can do this; you can make it your own.” Among the Jewish Grandparents Network’s newest initiatives is “Five Steps To …,” where Jewish educators and community leaders share their thoughts on how grandparents and family members can open the door to different Jewish practices and customs.
Having recently joined with our families and friends for Thanksgiving and Chanukah after two years of COVID-19 isolation, we reflect on what we have learned about grandparenting today and in grandparenting in the future. Close to half (48 percent) of Jewish grandparents in our 2019 study reported that they had not participated in a video call with their grandchild(ren) in the past year. In a small follow-up survey we conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic (“Grandparenting During COVID”), 80 percent of grandparents reported that they had participated in a video call with their grandchildren a minimum of two to three times a month. We also learned that 68 percent of grandparents had attended a remote Jewish life-cycle event (bris, bar/bat mitzvah, shivah call) during this period.
It seems evident that staying in touch with our families and engaging in Jewish life will increasingly rely on and benefit from virtual connections. The 40 percent of grandparents who live five hours or more from their grandchildren by car, bus, or train (as reported in the 2019 study) will no longer feel so isolated from their families. A growing number of adults will pursue Jewish learning, prayer, and engagement via webinars; virtual baby namings, Passover seders, and Shabbat services now welcome family members from around the world.
Jewish family life may be forever changed — in many ways for the better. Technology will offer us new ways to be together, to celebrate Shabbat, holidays, and life-cycle events, and to share and preserve our family stories. And through the Jewish Grandparents Network, grandparents and grandchildren will play, create, and read together, even though they may be in different cities, states, or nations, all while strengthening their ties to Jewish traditions and values and to each other.
A former Baltimore resident, David Raphael is co-founder and CEO of the Jewish Grandparents Network.
This piece first appeared as a guest essay in Gary Rosenblatt’s “Between The Lines” column on Substack. Rosenblatt was editor of The Jewish Week of New York and the Baltimore Jewish Times. Follow him at: garyrosenblatt.substack.com.
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