Bloomington, Indiana – With antisemitic rhetoric being spread across college campuses in the United States following Hamas’ attacks on Israel, Jewish students on IU’s campus feel unsafe and alone. The feeling of having to look over their shoulder when walking on campus in fear of what non-jewish students might do to them is prominent. However, one student is showing that faith can bring any religion together. 

 

Senior Joshua Crudup is a practicing Catholic. Growing up in Fort Wayne, he barely even understood what Judaism was. However, that all changed last year when a friend of his introduced him to Rabbi Sue Silberberg of the Indiana University Hillel Center. Rabbi Sue, as she’s known, was interviewing non-Jewish students to take on a yearly trip to Israel. Upon meeting and speaking with Crudup, she signed him up and off they went to the Middle East. 

Crudup didn’t go into the trip believing that he would be converted or that Rabbi Sue had an agenda. He believed and still does hold on to the fact that Israel is the home of all Abrahamic religions. The group traveled across the country seeing many religious sites before traveling to Gaza where the group heard antisemitic rhetoric being preached. The highlight of the trip for Crudup was being able to be baptized and perform baptisms for the non-Jewish students in the Jordan River.

Upon his return to campus, Crudup began to spend a lot of his time at the Hillel Center. He became more involved in the Jewish community and was immediately a staple at events held by the center. Crudup began attending a weekly meeting for both Jewish and non-Jewish students at the Neal Marshall Black Cultural Center. 

 

 

The upbeat mood for Crudup changed on October 7th when the terrorist group known as Hamas launched a series of brutal attacks on the Israeli community. Civilians were kidnapped and murdered among other things and antisemitism started to pick up across the world including on IU’s campus. Crudup felt distraught and immediately upon hearing what had happened, he went to the first place that he knew that he was needed; the Hillel Center. 

 

At a pro-Israel rally at Dunn Meadow just a week after the attacks, several Hillel students were asked to speak in front of a group of over 1,000 mainly Jewish students. While putting together the group of students, Rabbi Sue called up Joshua to speak about his experience in Israel and how the attacks had affected him. 

Crudup admitted that he did not know what he wanted to say and simply spoke from the heart. He explained that he was not Jewish but felt close to the community because of the togetherness that he felt during his time at Hillel. He spoke about his trip to Israel and that time made him feel closer to his Catholicism and motivated him to try to bring people together under the common belief in a higher power. Crudup serves as an example of how different religious ideologies can come together during times of divide.