Black Jews no longer in the background of US life

By way of a joke, Robin Washington, Minnesota newspaper editor, African American and observant Jew, explained how mainstream Christian society marginalizes Judaism in American life, filters its holidays through the lens of Christian tradition:

One kid: What ya getting for Christmas?

Another kid: I'm Jewish.

First kid: Oh. What ya getting for Jewish Christmas, then?

Washington's joke cuts to the heart of the relative isolation that Hanukkah endures on the national holiday calendar, and by extension the experience of black Jews, a minority inside a minority. As American Jews in general establish their identity in the face of the nation's predominately Christian identity, Jewish African-Americans -- who sometimes self-identify as "JOC's" (for Jews of color) -- face another challenge in the United States.
The idea of black Jews in America is more widely accepted than in years past, dovetailing with the nation's overall increasingly diverse demographic mosaic. But challenges exist in the integration of the black Judaic experience into a skeptical or disbelieving public, and into some aspects of Jewish tradition itself.
For Washington, editor in chief of the Duluth News Tribune, co-founder of the National Alliance of Black Jews, and an oft-quoted writer and essayist on the black Jewish experience, the sense of being "different" is one he felt most acutely through his children.
"Hanukkah isn't a major Jewish holiday, and only takes on that significance in the U.S. because of Christmas. By no means is it insignificant, but it's not Christmas," he told theGrio recently. "The problem, of course, is for families, and keeping your children from crying when their friends are visiting Santa and getting presents." Read more at the Grio.