Stefanskirche and a peculiar scent

At the tender age of eight, our teacher, Frau Klob, took us on a Lehrausflug, an educational excursion, to one of Vienna’s most iconic landmarks: the Stefanskirche, St. Stephen’s Cathedral.

Before I could whisper a word of hesitation, or reveal the fact that a Jewish girl was not supposed to enter a church, I was marching two by two, holding the hand of another little girl with bows in her hair, as we entered the enormous cathedral.

It was the eerie scent that first irritated my nostrils. The heavy fumes of incense seemed to attach themselves to me and remained in my memory for a very long time.

I tried hard not to look around. I pretended that none of it affected me, until we were led down ancient stone steps into the cellars beneath this monumental edifice.

There, my young eyes were exposed to something I later conveniently erased from my memory.

Fast forward many decades.

Last week, upon returning from a three-month stay in Israel, our family attended the funeral services of a loyal employee who had been part of our company for more than thirty years.

This was an altogether different experience from the one I remembered from childhood.

We stood behind closed glass partition doors, and somehow it did not affect me at all. Instead, I found myself observing the service and noticing how certain rituals performed by the priest reminded me, in unexpected ways, of our own traditions. At one point, I watched him lift a cup and drink from it, and my mind immediately traveled to the cup of Eliyahu HaNavi on our Seder table.

The church service was only the first part of the farewell. The burial followed at a cemetery about twenty minutes away in Long Beach.

By the time we arrived, the midday sun was blazing. I searched for shade and found refuge beneath an old oak tree.

From there I watched as, one after another, enormous flower arrangements were carried forward and placed around the gathering. Most were deep shades of red, with touches of white. Family and friends stood together as they delivered their eulogies and said goodbye to a man who had faithfully worked beside our family.

As I stood beneath that tree, I thought about the frightened eight-year-old Jewish girl in Vienna who could not wait to escape the strange scent and unfamiliar surroundings of the Stefanskirche.

So many decades had passed.

Standing there as an observant Jewish family, honoring a man who had faithfully worked beside us for so many years, I felt that our presence itself was a Kiddush Hashem.