My parents weren't "religious", yet they bequeathed to me the most precious values. Given the divisiveness that plagues the Jewish world, both within the observant community and between religious and secular Jews, I am particularly grateful for what my parents gave to me.

Eighteen years ago, at the age of 36, I started studying Torah for the first time. My rabbi emphasized that "a Jew is a Jew is a Jew,” that we are all one family. When I criticized certain things Jewish or certain Jewish people, he’d talk about loyalty; the kind of loyalty that pervades a family, that goes beyond intellect and judgment.

My parents lived this concept of loyalty. We were a family that stood by one another, and, more important, accepted one another, even when we differed.

No one tested my parents' tolerance more than I. I constantly went against the grain. I remember once being on a hunger strike in protest of some injustice, camped with fellow travelers in front of Chicago's City Hall. It was 11:30 p.m., and we were singing the civil rights anthem "We Shall Overcome." All of a sudden I looked up and saw my father approaching. He smiled, walked into the line, and sang along with us. My father was apolitical. He didn't protest, and didn't like that I protested.

"What are you doing here?" I asked him.

"I came to see how you’re doing," he said. My father didn't stay long, but long enough. I never forgot that night. His was a loyal act.

Flying back to Israel a few months ago, I sat next to a secular Israeli who didn't hold religious Jews in high regard. During the first hours of the flight, we found safe topics of conversation and became friendly.

Eventually, we braved more risky levels of discussion. Did we argue? A bit. But for the most part we listened to each other. This flight provided an opportunity to venture into knowing "the other." We both had more questions than answers. We were travelers into the unknown territory of each other; we recognized that the required skill on this journey was to put ourselves aside and attempt to see the world through the eyes of the other.

We pursued no agreement or understanding. Rather than seek to influence one another we recognized this unique opportunity to experience someone else's views while aware of our connection to each other as Jews.

There was no true outcome of our conversation. Yet we knew that in the anonymity of the flight, two Jews of different persuasions had bonded.

I haven't seen him since; I don't know if I'd recognize him on the street. I knew he would talk about our meeting to his wife and friends; I suspect that if he has, his experience was similar to mine. For weeks afterward, whenever I discussed Israeli politics or religious divisions between secular and religious Jews, I had the strange experience of hearing as I was he. The discussions took on new depth. Statements and answers that had been assumed became fresh and vibrant. I found myself in that exciting place where life's contradictions, when allowed to flourish rather than be buried beneath preconception, promise hope and reconciliation.

It was not that my opinions and beliefs changed; instead, they came alive. They became charged with curiosity, with a renewed sense of purpose. The stagnation that comes from certainty became electrified, even a bit chaotic. With the help of friends and rabbis, I re-explored subjects that had become crusty through habit. Rather than being threatened, my convictions became stronger, and more dynamic and responsive than before.

In those brief hours of bonding, a bonding whose only glue was the common Jewish soul within us, I found no solution to that which divides us. I saw only a possibility, an opening through which we might come together.

Since I only glimpsed this possibility I can't articulate it well. I only know that this possibility has as its requisite the unshakable recognition of the Jewish family we are, the loyalty we possess, and the unique soul we share.

Reflecting on the values my parents taught me in their own way of teaching without teaching, I remember that with family members, there’s not always the need to win or lose. There may be no apparent solution to fundamental differences among parents, children and siblings. But as family members, we need to trust that through loyalty, unqualified support and an unbreakable connection to one another, we will find our way.

Jay Litvin was born in Chicago in 1944. He moved to Israel in 1993 to serve as medical liaison for Chabad's Children of Chernobyl program, airlifting children from the areas contaminated by the Chernobyl nuclear disaster; he also founded and directed Chabad's Terror Victims program in Israel. Jay passed away in 2004 after a valiant battle with Lymphoma, and is survived by his wife, Sharon, and their seven children.

Originally published in The Jewish Homemaker