Okay, we worked out the problem with the Jewish Home. Turns out that at some point, my mother had put down on the hospital paperwork that Dad was Russian Orthodox.
Of course, he isn't. She was, and he went along with her, just as he did for every kooky religion she got into, from the initial catholicism (he used to sleep during mass; we'd nudge him when his snoring got to be too loud) to the John the Baptist Christian Renewal Community to the Jews for Jesus to finally Russian Orthodox.
Throughout it all, he went along, catching up on sleep when possible, enjoying the social aspects the rest of the time. But no, he wasn't Russian Orthodox. He was, and is, Jewish.
Not a practicing Jew, mind you, but a Jew nonetheless.
The Jewish Home for the Aged doesn't require residents to be active in their religion, but it does require that they haven't converted to something else. They saw the Russian Orthodox bit on the hospital paperwork and figured he had converted.
They didn't handle it in the best way they could have -- instead of calling the hospital and saying that he couldn't come there, they should have contacted the family and asked about it.
So at 9am on Wednesday morning, Rachel, her mom, and I stormed the doors of the Jewish Home and asked to see the two social workers. Alas, we had arrived during some meeting with the Rabbi, but the head of social services agreed to see us.
Rachel had had the presence of mind to bring a picture of my Dad's family (all of whom perished in a concentration camp) and his naturalization certificate. The latter was important for three reasons: it identified his former nationality as German, it showed his full middle name of Israel, and it listed his address as 23 Homewood Terrace.
In the thirties, the German government forced all male Jews to change their middle names to Israel so as to be able to identify them as being Jewish. (Women and girls had to change their middle names to Sarah.) This, of course, was to make it easier to identify them later on. So, a German with the middle name of Israel in the late 30's was either Jewish or suicidal.
On top of that, Homewood Terrace, where he grew up after arriving in America, was a Jewish orphanage. Living there meant also that he was Jewish.
So I pointed these out, as well as the fact that his family died at the hands of the nazis, and stated that to say that my father was not Jewish was to deny the holocaust!
Okay, perhaps that was a little strong, but I was desperate. I wanted the best for my father, and I believed (and still believe) that the Jewish Home for the Aged was his best option.
They said that they didn't deny the fact that he was Jewish, it's what he is now that was the problem. After reminding them that we had been told that it didn't matter whether or not he was practicing, they explained that the problem was that he couldn't have converted to something else. And as far as they knew, he was Russian Orthodox.
They showed us the hospital paperwork and explained that they had been reviewing the documentation that the hospital had sent in preparation of his discharge to the Jewish Home when someone noticed that the indicated religion was Russian Orthodox.
So we told them that my Mother had been Russian Orthodox when she passed away, and that she had probably written that down at some point, but that my dad had only gone along with her.
They left the room (the director of the entire facility was there by then) to discuss the matter. When they came back, they asked if Dad was coherent. They wanted to send the Rabbi and a social worker over to the hospital to ask Dad what he was. We said okay.
They checked their schedules, and determined that the Rabbi could be there at about 11am. It was a little before 10am. So we thanked them, headed out the door, and zipped over to the hospital. There we kinda suggested what to say.
Mind you, he wasn't Russian Orthodox, but he hadn't been a practicing Jew for a long time either. So when we asked him what religion he was, he sort of just shrugged his shoulders and didn't answer. So we explained the situation to him, and asked him if he was Jewish. He said he was. We asked him what religion he was, and he said Jewish. We went through it a few times, and then headed out so as not to be there when the Rabbi arrived.
On the way out, we caught up with Chris, Dad's physical therapist who was scheduled to work with him at 10:30 -- just before the Rabbi was to arrive. So we asked him to remind Dad at the end of the lesson that he is Jewish.
Well, it worked, Dad got accepted, and all is well. One of the things we think might happen is that Dad might get interested in becoming reacquainted with his heritage. Perhaps this will get him to open up a bit about his past. At the very least, he will get excellent therapy, and a lot of stimulation on top of it.