I was in college when I heard my first Jewish joke. I didn't understand what Judaism had to do with the shape of someone's nose, but everyone in the room certainly did. I reflexively looked in the mirror to see if mine was a dead giveaway.

It was my first encounter with one of many ugly stereotypes I would face for the rest of my life. So imagine my self-conscious shock when I stepped on to the 10th floor of the Spertus Museum and faced a wall of noses sniffing out my own prejudices.

If anyone questions Sen. Barack Obama’s commitment to the state of Israel, just ask the rabbi in his family. Rabbi Capers Funnye Jr., a cousin of the candidate’s wife, Michelle, not only believes that the candidate’s platform demonstrates a commitment to the Holy Land, he says it illustrates key Jewish precepts.

Jewish law requires married women to immerse themselves in a mikvah, or Jewish ritual bath, before resuming sexual relations with their husbands. But many American Jews have abandoned the ritual, calling it archaic and intrusive.

Now a growing number are trying to redeem the rite by inventing new ceremonies for the mikvah that mark modern transitions in a woman’s life.

See story and video below. Are there rituals within your religious tradition that you would expand to make more meaningful?

In what seemed like a dramatically disproportionate trade-off, the bodies of Israeli reserve soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and his comrade Eldad Regev returned to their loved ones on Wednesday in exchange for five Hezbollah fighters and the bodies of nearly 200 Arabs killed in clashes with the Jewish state. Why did the exchange seem so uneven?

Israel had promises to keep.

It can be a risky business to cross borders or question them—especially when people believe those borders demarcate and protect a holy land. Wars have been fought over Israel. Protests have erupted over Tibet. Some U.S. citizens shunned vodka when an Absolut ad suggested Mexico rule more of their country.

Hmm. Touch a nerve?

Do you ever reach a point when your soul is carrying such a crushing burden that sheer gravity overcomes you and the tears just start to fall? And if that ever happens, do you race for shelter to continue to weep? Or do you let the world see that you’re human and cry in public?

Seek forgiveness from those I’ve wronged? Check. Cancel Saturday brunch plans? Check. Find friend to babysit my BlackBerry? Check.

For all intents and purposes, I’m ready to observe Yom Kippur, the Sabbath of Sabbaths and Day of Atonement when faithful Jews fast from sundown to sundown and seek forgiveness from God.

Still, I face one nagging (and perhaps selfish and shallow) dilemma: Do I have to seek that forgiveness in a synagogue? Or does the sanctuary of a sailboat count?

By calling on governments to recognize an undivided Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, Messianic Jews meeting in Lincolnshire this week only managed to create more friction with American Jews, despite the fact they agree on the matter.

Jewish mothers everywhere will be telling their children to turn off the television and come to the Seder table Monday night, the first night of Passover, the season opener for Major League Baseball and the night of the NCAA basketball championship.

This week’s Newsweek claims to list the nation’s top 50 most influential rabbis. But not one rebbe on the list is from Chicago. They must be kibitzing.