this is the work of antichrist...
Christians at home in church with Jewish elements
news.rgj.com
Geralda Miller (gmiller@rgj.com)
RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL
October 29, 2005
Carmine Cantalupo, a fundamentalist Christian pastor, said he was "led" to a Reno church that blends Jewish scripture and culture with Christianity.
On Saturday mornings he attends Beth Am Echad Messianic Congregation, a non-denominational church that emphasizes the Bible's Old and New Testaments.
"We needed to learn more about what Jesus did, and that led us to a messianic congregation," Cantalupo said about himself and his wife, Charity. "This all goes back to the time of Jesus and what the Jewish people did and it's so awesome."
Messianic Jews believe Jesus Christ, whom they call Yeshua, is the messiah.
The mainstream Judaism belief is that the messiah has not yet come. Jews also believe anyone who believes Jesus is the messiah is not Jewish.
That has caused some controversy, said Hy Kozak, pastor of the congregation.
"They (Jewish people) don't look at us too kindly," Kozak said. "The attitude is that we've been part in helping Christians steal their God. That is the extreme essence."
Kozak described his church as a place where Jewish and gentile believers come to participate in a fundamentalist, born-again type of service mixed with Jewish elements.
The saying "the Old Testament is the New Testament concealed and the New Testament is the Old Testament revealed" is what they follow, he said.
"We don't like to throw away one and just focus on the other," he said. "And as a result we also get into not just a question of what would Jesus do but what was his teaching. What was his culture and how did that affect his actual teachings and the words that he gave us in the New Testament specifically."
Cantalupo joined about a dozen people during Oct. 22 services to celebrate Sukkot, the Jewish festival also known as the Feast of Tabernacles.
The holiday commemorates the years the Jews wandered in the desert and lived in temporary shelters. During the seven-day holiday, Jews build shelters, called a sukkah, where they typically eat their meals.
"If you read God's word, he commanded us to celebrate his feast," Cantalupo said. "We're not Jewish by birth, but we're adopted into God's family through Jesus Christ. So we are spiritual Jews."
It was "a Holy Spirit movement" that Kozak said drew him from his Orthodox Jewish roots.
"I stopped going to synagogue over 30 years ago," he said. "And then all of a sudden something swayed inside me. I wasn't really spiritually seeking or even spiritually involved or alive in anything when the whole thing happened."
Growing up in Brooklyn, N.Y., he said he knows of Jewish families who have disowned their son or daughter and had burial ceremonies if they became Christian.
But since his parents had already died, Kozak said he did not have that problem.
"If the family is alive, and if they do have strong ties to the Jewish religion, it can be quite upsetting," Kozak said.
People in the congregation take on as much of the Jewish tradition and culture as they wish.
Some men choose to wear the prayer shawl, called a tallit, and others wear a yarmulke on their heads.
Inside the ark on the altar are a Torah and a cross, emblematic of the Old and New Testament.
The music takes Cara Kozak, music leader and the pastor's wife, to another place. With her tambourine, she says she is communicating with God.
"This is a particular time when we can sing with our God," she said. "What I try to do is really sing out my heart to Him." |
