![Sammy Kanter](https://images.forwardcdn.com/image/center/author/cropped/sammykanterheadshot-1536765409.jpg)
Sammy Kanter is a first-year Rabbinical student at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, currently studying in Jerusalem, Israel
Sammy Kanter is a first-year Rabbinical student at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, currently studying in Jerusalem, Israel
A year and a half ago, I was thrown out of a pizza shop in Jerusalem for being gay. I was celebrating the LGBTQ+ Pride weekend with three fellow rabbinical students, and wearing a T-shirt with rainbow colored lettering. After entering the pizza shop, an employee asked me if I was gay. I said yes….
I grew up dreaming of the land of Israel. My family is both proudly Jewish and proudly American; we were raised to believe that America was the home where we lived, but that Israel was the place we could truly feel at home. I longed for an opportunity to visit and hopefully spend time living…