Osmosis is a subtle or gradual absorption or mingling. Sometimes we joke that you can’t learn something through osmosis. Learning is active and involves studying and practice. Well, when it comes to prayer, I can assure you that the best way to learn the words and melodies is by just sitting in services and even passively hearing them.

I’ve written before about my children being terribly behaved in services. My children either feel too at home in Temple (my husband is the Rabbi there), or something about being in the spotlight as the rabbi’s kids makes them nervous. Or, they’re just high-energy, fidgety kids who struggle with sitting still when they’re bored. This is a continuing issue that we are working on.

Thus, we get into synagogue and my kids tend to run around. Once in the sanctuary, they sit and talk, sit and move, and they want to draw. A mess ensues all around us. They want to get up to get a drink and go to the bathroom, repeatedly. They want to run into Daddy’s office. They want to do anything but sit nicely with the prayer book open and participate. The more I try to encourage them in the positive or threaten them with the negative, the more energy I put into wanting them to have good behavior, it seems the more they embarrass me. It’s actually a huge source of stress for me around going to the congregation as a family.

For those who know me, I’ve been advocating for community to be focused on things in addition to communal prayer. I think that Friday night worship or Saturday morning services may be continuing a model that needs to be revamped more than tweaked or edited. No “Blue Jeans Shabbat” is going to fix what can feel like irrelevant, Hebrew-heavy, long, rote, sometimes cheesy experiences. Yes, there are vibrant, engaging worship experiences out there. People flock to them, seek them out and live for them. But, I’ve had a conflicting personal love-hate relationship with liberal Jewish worship lately.

I think that especially for people newer to Judaism, interfaith families and those who are not following along in the Hebrew and who are not familiar with the prayers and music, it can feel overwhelming and challenging to make Jewish prayer our own.

So, consider all of that with what I’m going to now say. My 7-year-old, who is not paying attention in synagogue and who may unconsciously sense my own stress and discomfort with communal worship, knows the main prayers in Hebrew, in tune. She gets most of the words slightly wrong, but she’s got the basic idea. When I asked her what the V’ahavta means, she said, “It’s a prayer to God.” She knows it’s central, important and about connecting with God. And, I’m happy for her that it works for her and proud that Judaism is a source of roots for her.

We go to synagogue once a month for the early, shorter family service and that’s how she’s learned this. Through osmosis. I am looking forward to her refining her pronunciation as she hears the correct words over and over.