Jew-ish Louis

By all accounts, Zambians are very religious people. From mid-week lunchtime fellowships to "I Love Jesus" caps sold in abundance at the markets to the 24-hour GOD television network, Christianity is a way of life for most people here.

It's one of the first questions foreigners are typically asked in conversation with Zambian men and women: which church do you go to?

The simplest answer, which I provide when I'm in a hurry or not in the mood for deep discussion, is to follow my mother's religious tradition, and tell people I'm Anglican. Without exception, this response evokes instant understanding, and the conversation continues elsewhere.

Occasionally, with more time on my hands and greater interest in the given conversation, I follow my father's side, and tell people I'm Jewish. This is normally met with mild surprise followed by a mixture of curiosity and understanding ("I'm a monotheist too!"). I've had a couple extensive conversations about key differences between Christian and Jewish belief.

With close friends and lots of time to spare, I choose option three: I'm stuck in the middle. Like many Canadians, I am hyphenated and confused. To the total surprise of most people I say this to, I am not particularly religious. I am interested in religion (which is the truth), but I wasn't raised with it; I don't have a single go-to or fall-back religion; and as much as I might like the comfort and personal conviction of religious faith, I am quite happy living in curiosity, at least for now. In a Jesus-loving a country like Zambia, none of this really makes any sense.

The other day, while interviewing two deaf women and a deaf man for my disability project, communicating in writing because the interpreter was busy, I was asked the time-honoured question.

"My mother is Anglican. But my father is Jewish," I daringly wrote in reply.

All three burst out in laughter.

"They love each other," I wrote. "Strange?"

"Yes but you are perfect Jewish."

I never did figure out what that meant. In any event, religion has provided some of my most fruitful and engaging conversations in Zambia. The times that I've broached my truthful response – nuanced and peculiar religious limbo, as opposed to straight-up Anglicanism or Judaism – the ensuing discussion, though long, has never become hostile. In Zambia, there's almost no situation that can't be alleviated, no tension that can't be resolved, with a friendly, heartfelt smile.