Marjorie Ingall
By Marjorie Ingall
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News A Thing of the Past
Objects have power. In my last column I wrote about the power of Christian right-wing trinkets as symbols of identity and values. A Torah is another powerful object; when it’s no longer usable it has to be buried, like a dead body. Then there’s the power of loveys and blankies — they’re sources of security,…
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News Stranger in a Strange Land
In “Rapture Ready: Adventures in the Parallel Universe of Christian Pop Culture” (Scribner, 2008), Daniel Radosh presents a delightfully varied compendium of Christian items known among many actual Christians as “Jesus junk.” These include candy conversation hearts imprinted with “John 3:16” and “He Lives” instead of “Kiss Me” and “Sweet Talk.” There are Faith Pops…
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News It’s a Mall World After All
I have written of my Disney evolution. I used to sneer at the company and its products. I used “Disneyfied” as shorthand for “cleaned-up, dumbed-down, soulless mass-market consumerist cheese.” And then I had kids. Okay, I still think the movies are uneven (and sometimes sexist and racist); we prefer kid sister Pixar’s wit and complexity….
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Culture A Kid-Friendly Seder
Purim is funny. Passover, not so much. My kids always have a hard time transitioning out of Purim, with its nutso kid-friendly awesomeness. Grandma Betsy’s chocolate hamentashen will always trump leaden macaroons and The Jellied Fruit Slices of Doom. And this year, Josie was old enough to groove along to our shul’s Purim shpiel, “The…
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News Give a Little
As many of us know, tzedakah doesn’t actually mean “charity.” It means “righteousness.” But our family generally uses tzedakah to mean donating money or goods, and mitzvot to mean doing good deeds. My desire to have my children engaged in acts of tikkun olam — repairing the world — is entirely selfish: If my children…
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News Bully for You
Adventures in sibling conflict, installment #3,121: Three months ago, at the Sacred Ritual Changing of the Toothbrushes, it was Josie’s turn to choose a brush. She chose the pink My Little Pony version with lavender bristles, leaving the purple one with blue bristles for Maxie, who wailed in thwarted fury. (If I could get the…
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News History in the Making
Voting in this year’s primary was thrilling. As always, Josie accompanied me into the booth. She’s clueful about how it works now, after reading a number of books about the democratic process. Our favorite is the delightful picture book “Vote!” by Eileen Christelow (Clarion, 2003), which uses a pretend mayoral election to explain debates, fundraising,…
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News The Old Gray Mère: Does She… or Doesn’t She?
I apologize in advance for the possible vapidity of this column. In my next piece I will discuss my plan for Middle East Peace, the fate of the Jewish people in an age of rampant intermarriage, and Martin Buber. But right now, I’m anxious about my hair. It’s getting gray, and I am not happy…
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