NOT long after Sept. 11, 2001, an African American security guard packing a barely concealed gun stood in Temple Sinais foyer before the Friday night service.
A fish out of water, he kept his words to an awkward minimum.
Hi. Hello. How you doing.
There was something very reassuring about this nameless man whose professional bearing did not compromise his warmth.
Before too many Shabbats had elapsed, congregants were calling him by his first name Sam.
Sam responded in kind, sharing personal greetings with the regulars and wishing a Shabbat Shalom to less familiar faces.
When I received this assignment, I didnt know this was a synagogue, Sam Howard recently told the Intermountain Jewish News. It was just a regular posting. But I really didnt know what to expect because Id never been to a synagogue of any kind before.
Some of the guys at work thought it was funny a black man doing security work at a Jewish temple, he adds with a laugh.
Eventually, the chemistry between the security guard and Reform temple mushroomed.
He acquired the nickname Sam the Man for his quick ability to ice thumbs accidentally ensnared by car doors, fix assorted problems and answer questions about a Bar or Bat Mitzvah or educational program.
During professional lulls on Saturday mornings, Sam would sit with congregants he knew well. Instead of making empty chitchat, hed gently inquire about a sad or troubled look that caught his eyes.
He never crossed boundaries, never demanded a response. But something about Sam effortlessly encouraged communication.
On rare occasions, Sam revealed dark periods from his familys past.
My grandfather was murdered by the KKK, he once told a small group as they waited for Torah study. The shocking statement fell so matter-of-factly that no one could speak.
Were so sorry, they said finally.
You dont have anything to be sorry about, he said. There are good people and bad people you all know about that.
Time passed. Friendships flourished. Mutual respect grew.
A few years ago, Sams intellectual interest in Judaism deepened into love.
There was no going back, only forward. He was hooked.
Some congregants understood the source of this new fire in Sams soul, while others ascribed the subtle changes to outside circumstances.
In February of 2009, Sam officially converted to Judaism and youve never seen a happier guy in your life.
SITTING in Sinais subdued youth lounge, Sam recalls the gradual process that led to his life-changing decision.
Initially hired to work on Friday nights, Sam would patrol the synagogue watching for suspicious behavior or the lone individual who looked out of place.
But Id also stand outside the sanctuary and listen when I could, he acknowledges. Very much so.
At first it was like Martian to me, he says of the Hebrew songs and prayers. It was all Hebrew. That didnt help at all. I said to myself, oh golly!
He memorized the music and began humming the melodies to himself. That part was easy.
Later, Sam retrieved a prayer book from the cart in the hallway, read the English transliteration and I was able to follow what was being said.
It was like a revelation, Sam says of the content. It was like, this is what Ive always been about. I wanted a relationship with G-d directly, as opposed to going through an intermediary.
Its like when I talk to my Dad. I want to talk to him, not somebody over there.
Sam realized that Jews valued something he had desired since abandoning Christianity at age 16 directness with G-d.
He studied Hebrew with Rabbi Jay TelRav at Temple Sinai. He taught me the alphabet, how to recognize the letters which Im still trying to catch up on.
Every year, Sam caught the spirit of Passover spreading throughout the congregation.
They were celebrating the exodus of the Israelite people, he says, which I celebrated as a kid. And I said, yeah.
Sam is descended from slaves on both his paternal and maternal side. The Cherokees enslaved his mothers family. His fathers descendants toiled as slaves on various plantations including the Howard plantation.
Sam says that he could not be bothered with any religion that remotely encouraged a slave mentality.
The truth is, I left Christianity because I could not justify going through an overseer to G-d, he says. I couldnt justify that. If I was going to believe in a religion, it was going to take me straight to the Creator. I didnt want to wait at a rest stop.
This is what I find in Judaism.
SAM enrolled in Introduction to Judaism (ITJ), a two-year prerequisite course for potential converts that also attracts people desirous of more Jewish knowledge, in January of 2007.
Asked whether there was a certain moment when he decided to convert, Sam recounts how a woman whose kids attend Sinais religious school found out he was going to his first ITJ class and offered to come with him.
Now, this woman didnt know me from Adam. I thought that was so nice of her. Outside of my immediate family, no one had ever done that for me. I was just the security guy here.
So when the instructor asked me whether I was taking the course for informational purposes or to convert, the incident just solidified my answer.
I wanted to become a Jew.
For Sam, Judaism not only offered an unobstructed path to G-d, it overflowed with good-hearted people.
The combination was irresistible.
Sam adjusts his kufi, a prayer hat worn by brown people of African persuasion. I wear this because its part of my culture, my tradition, as an African American.
On Friday nights, Saturdays and Monday nights, he dons his security cap at Sinai unless hes attending the Saturday morning minyan, where he wears either a kufi or yarmulke.
Sam laughs.
You got all that?
SAM Howard was born in Lynchburg, Virginia, near the Tennessee-Kentucky border. Due to the towns racist predilections, his father decided to move the family to Washington, DC.
My dad was 11 when he received a letter from my grandmother telling him that my grandfather had been murdered by the KKK in Highpoint, NC, Sam says. Its something thats plagued my family for years.
Sam equates his upbringing in Washington with a black Norman Rockwell childhood. Nice house, kids running around. It was great.
Children of all shapes, sizes and colors played together in his mixed neighborhood.
When I got to high school, I realized I was different, he says.
I couldnt put my finger on it. But groups became segregated: whites hung out with whites, blacks hung out with blacks. Still, I didnt pay a lot of attention to it.
He joined the army in 1974 and was sent overseas right after America pulled its troops out of Vietnam.
Assigned to a special weapons unit in Germany, he guarded military installations and performed various security functions throughout the world.
The army also trained Sam in cartography (mapmaking), a skill he put to use when he returned to the US in 1976.
A cartographic technician in Bethesda, Md., until he was laid off in 1983, he worked odd jobs until he received an unexpected call from Denver a few months later.
My dad said someone wanted to talk to me about working as a cartographer in Denver, Sam says. I had no idea where Denver was just out West someplace.
The federal agency offered the position to Sam sight unseen.
He accepted, and arrived in the Mile High City 27 days later.
A full-time cartographer with the federal government, he accepts security work on nights and weekends.
Security has always important to me, says Sam, who once contemplated becoming a policeman. Even though my primary focus was cartography, I wanted to use my security skills.
At Sinai, he patrols the synagogue and religious school, monitors the parking lot, checks doors, makes sure everything is cool, put it in my log and move on.
And up.
WHEN Sam was called to make an aliyah in March of 2009 to officially welcome him into the congregation, the sanctuary was packed.
Rabbi Rick Rheins, who served as Sams conversion sponsor, officiated.
I practiced and practiced the pronunciation, Sam says, and afterward, I thought I did OK. But so many people came up to me. People Id never seen before were shaking my hand. It was like, Sam, you are part of us now.
Even before his aliyah, rumors of his conversion set off fireworks of praise throughout the congregation.
It was like I was on a football team that just won the championship, Sam beams. One man pulled me aside and said, I bet you didnt expect to be a rock star.
The emotion I felt was overwhelming.
Some of his relatives were less enthusiastic.
They would ask me, What about Jesus, Sam?
His eyes curl into a wink.
Well, Jesus aint got nothing to do with it.
Earlier this year, Sam met Dorothy Fogle, a lovely African American woman of Creole descent. It didnt take long for them to fall in love.
Because he was serious about her, Sam felt he had to emphasize Judaisms importance in his life.
I told her, honey, Im Jewish, and Im going to be Jewish for the rest of my life. Thats the way it is.
Dorothy understood.
She accompanied Sam to the Saturday morning minyan in the summer and read the English transliteration.
Like me, she realized she was saying a prayer that was going directly to G-d, he says. After the couple chose a wedding date August, 2011 Dorothy announced that she wanted to become a Jew.
I had nothing to do with it, Sam stresses.
After spending time with me and my Sinai friends, she decided this on her own.
I warned her that conversion means shes going to have to work long and hard, and she said shed do whatever it takes.
These days, Sam is caught in a whirlwind of excitement, amazement, and awe.
G-d has been leading my steps all this time, he says. G-d brought me to Temple Sinai. I did not know this place, but G-d brought me here.
G-d sent me an angel named Dorothy and said, Its up to you now.
He blinks in disbelief.
All this has happened in the last year-and-a-half. Its such a short time. Im so overwhelmed with joy about the whole thing. And I know that G-ds hand is in all of this.
Copyright © 2010 by the Intermountain Jewish News
