The Communal Response to Intermarriage: A Time to Reflect, A Time to Resolve

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published on eJewishPhilanthropy

As the new year approaches, I’m cleaning out my office (I’m a replaced CEO, now a consultant after hiring a terrific successor for InterfaithFamily), sorting through twenty years’ worth of papers and repeatedly reminded that the Jewish community’s response to intermarriage has differed vastly from its response to all other issues. At a time at a time of self- and communal- reflection and resolution-making, I’m asking why that is so, and whether this might finally be the year that a massive, coordinated effort to engage interfaith families in Jewish life and community begins.

I. The Communal Response to Intermarriage Is Different

The Jewish community is filled with talented, committed, and philanthropic leaders of organizations and funders. When there has been leadership and collaboration, the response to issues has been massive and near-universal. I’m thinking of the recent announcement that the Schusterman and Jim Joseph foundations will give $28.8 million over five years to BBYO; that it’s hard to find a community, federation or organization that is not actively addressing disability inclusion or teen engagement; about investments in day schools, PJ Library, summer camps, Hillel, Birthright Israel – all important, deserving efforts.

But no similarly massive, concerted response to intermarriage has been made.

Not that there haven’t been calls to action from respected places. In my clean-up I found a 1994 report of a Council of Jewish Federations task force that said, in response to the near-50% intermarriage rate in the 1990 NJPS, “The Jewish community has no choice [but] to respond with a broadened array of opportunities to engage the intermarried in communal life and community services,” and “With Federation leadership, services to the intermarried can be part of a total communal effort rather than just one of an individual organization.”

I found a speech for a 2005 JOI conference by Michael Rukin, z”l, a senior leader of CJP, Hillel and HIAS, who wrote that programmatic allocations since the 1990 NJPS showed that any call for more extensive outreach had been lost to programs that followed a strategy to “infuse the core Jews with greater knowledge, affiliation and commitment and the rest will follow.” “Fifteen years later, … the demographics of affiliation and intermarriage have not changed.” Rukin called for a “massive investment in creative programs of outreach to these families and their children,” “a significant change in the language (both verbal and on-verbal) towards” them, “a broad base of institutions working together,” “a major commitment from the federation system to infuse their agencies with a thrust of creative outreach programs,” a “renewed commitment from the religious movements,” and “the continued prodding of inspired philanthropists… with a rollout plan to massive numbers… [and] budget, way beyond the minuscule amounts currently available.”

The closest we ever came to following these recommendations was a 2008 Interfaith Initiative Funding Proposal, put together by a consortium of major foundations. Citing a “critical moment in the history of modern day Jewry,” the consortium said the “vibrancy, size and strength of the Jewish people” depended upon “a powerful new vision that empowers and enables the Jewish community to better serve” the “rapidly expanding population” of interfaith families with children. The proposal called for $7.5 million over three years to create a national entity, a “state of the art web site” (an enhanced www.interfaithfamily.com), and an array of integrated programs and services, targeted to interfaith families with children, in three pilot communities.

The consortium’s proposal wasn’t funded because of Madoff and a financial downturn. But I’ve never understood why, in the eight years since, that proposal, or something like it, wasn’t revived or redesigned, and then implemented by some new coalition of funders.

II. Why the Difference?

Why haven’t there been massive, concerted efforts to engage interfaith families? Some cite limited resources and competing priorities and not fitting with their strategies. But can anyone who wants to see more people more Jewishly engaged in any activity – learning, social justice, spirituality – question whether getting interfaith couples and families involved is essential to reaching those goals? Interfaith families are where the people we want to be Jewishly engaged are.

Some say we don’t need to address the issue explicitly, or offer targeted programs; if we build up pre-schools and camps and teen and college programs etc., those will capture enough interfaith families. But the leaders of those programs (including PJ Library and Birthright Israel) say that interfaith families and their children are their growth markets, and they aren’t satisfied with the numbers they’re reaching. One thing I learned over the last twenty years is that engaging interfaith families is a continuum that for many starts with addressing issues as they are dating and getting married; services and programs targeted at interfaith couples and families will result in many more of them getting involved later.

Some measure success by attracting large numbers of participants, and say that interfaith family engagement programs don’t. Another thing I’ve learned: engaging interfaith families depends largely on one-on-one or small group work with trained staff, or volunteers trained by staff, that don’t reach large numbers; interfaith family engagement work makes one Jewish family at a time, or at best, small groups of them. Another thing: “interfaithness” is a salient characteristic for interfaith couples during transitional, life cycle times but not all of the time. That makes it difficult to put on big-number programs; even at holiday times, interfaith couples may not want to be together with others like themselves the way that LGBT people and Jews of color might.

Some say that staff-driven relationship building is too expensive. But other well-funded programmatic interventions are staff-driven and expensive, and there is no reason to believe that the cost-per-participant-per-benefit is significantly higher for efforts to engage interfaith families.

Some say they’d like to support or take action to engage interfaith families but don’t know what works. In fact, this isn’t rocket science. There’s been remarkable consensus, from the 1994 CJF task force report, through the Interfaith Initiative Funding Proposal, to today: interfaith couples need easy access to information, explicitly welcoming messages and experiences, and services and programs to help them while dating and getting married and to find community with other Jewishly-engaged interfaith couples at the outset of their journeys.

Some say that evaluation of interfaith family engagement programs is insufficient without random sample, control group research like there is for Birthright Israel. But steadily increasing numbers of the best feasible evaluations show that interfaith family engagement programs achieve their desired outcomes. Other areas of Jewish life haven’t had to wait for gold standard proof of program effectiveness. Where information was inadequate, significant research was funded, with a commitment to then fund the directions indicated by the research. Why hold efforts to engage interfaith families to higher standards?

III. What’s Needed for Change

I believe that what makes the response to intermarriage different is continuing negative attitudes. Back in 1994, the CJF task force said that “Some significant changes may need to occur in both staff attitudes and approaches at every level in Federation and community agencies and organizations” to treat “intermarried families with sensitivity and respect.”  Not nearly enough change has occurred.

The traditional community in the US, let alone in Israel, sees any effort to engage interfaith families as intolerable promotion of intermarriage. Too many leaders still think we should discourage and can prevent intermarriage. Some think Birthright Israel, with fewer trip participants intermarrying than non-participants, is the antidote. It’s wonderful when young Jews marry other Jews, but as I’ve said before, sending everyone on Birthright is not sufficient: many people already have aged out of Birthright, and significant percentages of trip participants still intermarry.

The liberal Jewish community isn’t exempt from deep-seated negative attitudes. Some horror stories from the past few years: the active synagogue member, Harvard Business School grad, not herself Jewish, hearing someone at her synagogue say “we Jews are dumbing ourselves down by intermarrying;” the interfaith couple who reported, in a federation’s survey, that they were trying out services at a synagogue where someone said “maybe you people would be more comfortable somewhere else.”

Some think that negative attitudes among Jews about intermarriage will lessen over time because today’s young adults don’t think that way. I question how fast that will happen, given studies reporting college students questioning the Jewishness of other students.

In InterfaithFamily’s recent evaluations, some professionals have said that their lay leadership in is “behind” in understanding the importance of welcoming interfaith families. But when rabbis say they can’t or won’t officiate at weddings of interfaith couples, the Jewish stamp of disapproval on the relationship is unavoidable.

In the Hornstein Program I learned from Ron Heifitz’s Leadership Without Easy Answers that leaders move people to adapt their attitudes; the prime example was Lyndon Johnson who ironically, given his background, led Americans to give up their opposition to civil rights. Given the fractured nature of the Jewish community, I can’t foresee a single Lyndon Johnson able to move Jews to genuinely embrace interfaith couples.

Perhaps massive concerted action to engage interfaith families hasn’t happened because funders and organizations are consensus-driven. But lack of consensus hasn’t always prevented near-universal action in the liberal Jewish community – I’m thinking of the thankfully now widespread efforts to welcome LGBT people.

It may be that what is needed is a group of key leaders who jointly have the capability to lead an adaptation of attitudes in the community – and to fund and take action to engage interfaith families.

I admit to being a glass half-empty person. Over the past twenty years there has been progress, with ups and downs. Individual generous funders have led the way and enabled impactful efforts to engage interfaith families to occur. The InterfaithFamily/Your Community model with two full-time staff including a rabbi is now in place in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Washington DC. Cleveland has an affiliate with a full-time rabbi on one of its agency’s staffs. Honeymoon Israel is taking growing numbers of interfaith couples on impactful trips to Israel. There is ongoing activity in Boston, New York, Baltimore and elsewhere.

The award of the Genesis Prize to Michael Douglas and the resulting matching challenge grant initiative has stimulated interest among some funders, which the Jewish Funders Network is continuing to address, and other funders are talking. On October 26 the Interfaith Opportunity Summit will bring key foundation and federation leaders together with interfaith family engagement practitioners and other organizational leaders to explore what is needed to engage interfaith families in Jewish life nationally and in local communities.

I am an ever-hopeful person, too. There’s a strong foundation for the massive concerted effort that’s needed, and there’s growing interest and awareness of the importance of the issue. What we need now is resolve – will this be the year?

Intermarriage Crossroads?

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August 4, 2016
with Jodi Bromberg, CEO, InterfaithFamily
published on eJewishPhilanthropy

A significant upcoming convening may lay the groundwork for something missing from the liberal Jewish community for the past twenty-five years: concerted action by funders and community leaders to engage more interfaith families in Jewish life and community.

InterfaithFamily, in partnership with the Jewish Funders Network and the Jewish Federations of North America, is sponsoring the Interfaith Opportunity Summit: Embracing the New Jewish Reality, on Wednesday October 26, 2016 at the National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia.

The goal of the Summit is to explore – with funders, federations, leaders of Jewish organizations and interfaith family engagement practitioners – the issues that need to be addressed to have more interfaith families engage in Jewish life and community, and begin to build consensus for increased efforts towards that end.

Jewish leaders have repeatedly expressed concern since high intermarriage rates were announced in the early 1990’s. In most fields – day schools, camps, teen engagement, Israel trips, social justice – funders and professionals have joined together to plan, support and execute major programmatic activities to strengthen organizations and expand recruitment.

The field of engaging interfaith families, however, is different, distinguished by the lack of concerted action by funders and professionals. Individual organizations – notably the Reform movement, Big Tent Judaism, and InterfaithFamily – have developed and offered successful programmatic efforts, and generous foundations, federations and individuals have made those efforts possible with financial support. But there has never been concerted action like that in other fields, apart from a proposal for joint action by several foundations in 2008-2009 that failed because of losses dues to Madoff and the economic downturn.

It is interesting to speculate on the reasons why arguably the single most important issue for the liberal Jewish community has not attracted concerted action. It may be that intermarriage is still viewed so negatively by so many that funders and professionals are discouraged from supporting any related efforts that are not designed to discourage or prevent it. Or, that there is simply too wide a chasm between those who wish to prevent or discourage intermarriage and those that seek to embrace and welcome interfaith couples and families – and therefore, no shared understanding of the way forward.

Recent signs, however, indicate a growing shift in attitudes that could support significant concerted action to engage interfaith families – most notably, the award of the Genesis Prize to Michael Douglas in order to highlight the importance of welcoming intermarried families, followed by the Jewish Funders Network/Genesis Prize matching grant initiative to attract increased financial support for those welcoming efforts. In addition, there has been increased attention from organizations like Hillel, and the Union for Reform Judaism’s “Audacious Hospitality” work.

The Interfaith Opportunity Summit will now bring together everyone interested or potentially interested in engaging interfaith families Jewishly – foundations, federations, Jewish organizations and interfaith family engagement practitioners. The initial response to the Summit is another sign of shifting attitudes; in addition to partnering with the JFN and the JFNA, participants in the Summit program include:

  • the URJ, Big Tent Judaism, Honeymoon Israel and InterfaithFamily;
  • the Schusterman, Crown, Jacobson, Lippman Kanfer, Miller, Joyce & Irving Goldman, and Genesis Prize foundations;
  • the Philadelphia, Boston, New York and LA federations;
  • national organizations including Hillel, the Foundation for Jewish Camp, PJ Library, the JCC Association, the Society for Classical Reform Judaism, the Reconstructionist movement, the Federation of Jewish Mens Clubs and International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism;
  • thought leaders including Yehuda Kurtzer, Alan Cooperman, Ted Sasson, Tobin Belzer, Fern Chertok, Wendy Rosov, Susan Katz Miller, Keren McGinity, Paul Golin and Marion Usher;
  • numerous innovative organizations including Romemu, Lab/Shul, jewbelong, Tribe 12, Sixth & I, Central Synagogue, Rodeph Shalom, the JCC in Manhattan, Jewish Learning Ventures.

Because of the importance of understanding the lived experiences of interfaith families, Summit participants will also hear from millennial children of intermarriage, young interfaith couples, and interfaith families with young children. The grantees of the JFN/Genesis Prize matching grant initiative, and other interfaith family engagement programs, have all been invited to participate and discuss their programs with interested attendees at tables over an extended lunchtime.

The Summit will provide a rich discussion of the issues that need to be addressed to have more interfaith families engage in Jewish life and community. How can Jews and their partners from different faith traditions experience the value of Jewish wisdom, express their spirituality in Jewish settings, and feel included in “the Jewish people?” How can we effectively reach the spectrum of interfaith couples, from those who are seeking to those who are not, through messaging and marketing to interfaith families, and relationship building/community organizing approaches to them? What services and programs are effective entry points and ways to facilitate progress into more engagement, and what promising trends are emerging? How can we address difficult attitude and boundary issues surrounding intermarriage: privileging in-marriage, wedding officiation, ritual participation, and conversion? Can those who say they are “doing both” be included in Jewish life and communities?

The concluding plenary will tie together the preceding sessions and address what a local Jewish community needs to offer to engage interfaith families, and the appropriate roles of general programs aimed at and marketed for everyone, and programs targeted at people in interfaith relationships.

By bringing together funders and organization leaders – people in a position to make things happen – with practitioners in the field, we hope to build consensus on what increased efforts need to be taken to engage interfaith families and to facilitate the possibility of concerted large-scale action towards that goal. We hope that you’ll be there to join the conversation.

Jodi Bromberg is the CEO of InterfaithFamily. Ed Case, the founder of InterfaithFamily, is an independent writer, speaker and consultant. More information about the Interfaith Opportunity Summit program is available here, and registration is available here.

Naming the Issue

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I believe that if engaging interfaith families is going to be a priority, it needs to be called out. It needs to be named. So I’m very attuned to omissions – when I think golden opportunities to refer to engaging interfaith families are missed.

Two weeks ago Rabbi Rick Jacobs, the excellent leader of the Reform movement, wrote that Synagogue Innovation is the Key to Strengthening Jewish Life. It’s a fine article, and I personally agree with the major point – that innovation is needed, and that it is happening not only in small start-ups but also in many congregations. I just wish that the examples of synagogue innovation – new dues structures, family engagement and retention, leadership and governance, disabilities inclusion, engaging Jews of color and millennials – could have included engaging interfaith families.

Today Rabbi Daniel Schiff wrote There’s No Place Like Home. Again the major point – that strengthening the Jewish home, in addition to institutions, is an important strategy – is well taken. But there’s not even a mention of all of the Jewish homes headed by interfaith partners, or the opportunity strengthen the Jewishness of more of those homes. That may not be surprising, given the author’s praise for the Statement on Jewish Vitality, which is terrible for what it says and doesn’t say about intermarriage, as I’ve explained before.

A New Phase

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I’m excited about a new phase in my professional life, and in the ongoing growth of InterfaithFamily.

After founding InterfaithFamily as an independent non-profit in October 2001, and leading it until my able successor Jodi Bromberg took over as CEO in March 2015, and staying on to help as an employee through June 2016 – I’m no longer employed!

But I’m not retiring, either. I’m now self-employed, as an independent consultant, continuing to address the issue I still care very passionately about: engaging interfaith families in Jewish life and community.

I’m grateful to be consulting to IFF, initially on a half-time basis for the rest of 2016. I still think that IFF’s integrated web-based and local programming approach offers the single best available opportunity to engage more interfaith families Jewishly, and I still care very passionately about IFF’s continued growth. I’ll be working in particular on the Interfaith Opportunity Summit program that I developed for IFF in the first half of 2016 – and urge everyone interested in the issues to attend.

I’m going to continue to write about interfaith family engagement issues on this blog – I hope you will sign up to receive my blog posts by email – and will be sharing what I write with IFF. I’m also available to speak at and consult with other organizations – if you’re interested, please connect with me.

When I decided in 2013 that I wanted to continue to work at IFF but to find someone to take over leadership of IFF, most everyone said that a founder has to get out immediately (it’s euphemistically called the “graceful exit strategy” in business school circles). Jodi and I didn’t do it that way, but now it’s the right time: for me to add my voice to our cause on an independent basis, and to help IFF on a consulting basis where and when I can, and for IFF to soar under Jodi’s leadership.

It’s an exciting time of opportunity for me and for IFF, and I’m eager to see how it unfolds.

Responding to the Intermarriage News

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March 2002

Recent weeks have been filled with news and opinion about intermarriage. Unfortunately, important Jewish leaders continue to respond in ways that will discourage interfaith families from engaging in Jewish life.

Item: The American Jewish Identity Survey 2001 reports that 51% of Jews are intermarrying; 33% of “core” Jews–those who say Judaism is their religion, who say they are of Jewish parentage or upbringing but have no religion, or those who consider themselves Jewish–are married to non-Jews, up from 28% in 1990; almost one-third of core Jews do not have Jewish mothers. However, the number of American Jewish households affiliated with a synagogue has increased by 15% to about 1 million. Forty-one percent of affiliated households belong to the Reform Movement, up from 35% in 1990. Thirty percent of core Jews identify with the Reform Movement, more than any other.

Response: According to JTA, Steven M. Cohen said that counting households rather than individuals is “artificially boosting the Reform movement by adding non-Jews to their memberships. If the Reform movement is drawing a lot of intermarried households, they’re picking up one Jew per household or maybe one and some kids.” Jonathan Rosenblum, in the February 8 International Jerusalem Post, writes that “intermarriage continues to decimate American Jewry” and suggests that Rabbi Eric Yoffie, head of the Reform Movement, is not devoted to Jewish survival.

Item: An intermarried congregant of a Pittsburgh Reform synagogue sought to be admitted to Hebrew Union College’s rabbinic program.

Response: The Central Conference of American Rabbis’ Responsa Committee reaffirmed HUC’s ban on ordaining intermarried Jews as rabbis or cantors.

Item: A study of Conservative Jews shows that those who attended the Movement’s Ramah summer camps are more religiously observant and Jewishly committed than those who did not attend. However, while 78% of Ramah alumni said it is “very important” to marry someone Jewish, only 30% said they date only Jews. One alumna said that she wanted “100 percent” to raise her kids Jewish, but would probably marry a non-Jew if she fell in love with one.

Response: According to JTA, Rabbi Sheldon Dorph, national Ramah director, described the findings that Ramah alumni are relatively accepting of intermarriage and interdating as “scary” and said the camps “may need to do more to discourage intermarriage.”

The common theme here is a negative reaction not just to intermarriage itself, but further to any proactive response to intermarriage. Instead of applauding or implementing actions that encourage more interfaith families to make Jewish choices for themselves and their children, such actions are criticized, or not even contemplated.

Among the religious movements, the Reform Movement certainly has been the most welcoming of interfaith families. Mr. Cohen takes a cheap shot that the Reform Movement is picking up “only one Jew per household [and] maybe some kids.” The new AJIS survey suggests that the Movement’s welcoming of interfaith families has led to more Jewish involvement by those families. These include not only Jews, but also non-Jews who engage in Jewish life, and who even may ultimately choose to become Jewish. That approach should be praised, not belittled.

The fact that an intermarried Jew would want to become a Reform rabbi is a striking, even if rare, testament to the depth and strength of Jewish commitment that is possible in an intermarriage. In upholding the HUC ban on accepting intermarried rabbinical students, the CCAR Responsa Committee said that a rabbi should teach by personal example the ideal of in-marriage. Rabbi David Ellenson, HUC president, has stated that Jewish continuity is the primary value underlying the decision. But having more intermarried people get more involved in Jewish life arguably would serve the value of Jewish continuity more than anything else would. Instead of barring them, why not encourage intermarried people to become rabbis and thus role models for extensive engagement in Jewish life by others like them?

The fact that Camp Ramah alumni are more committed Jews is to be applauded. The fact that many of those alumni are accepting of intermarriage, instead of leading the camps to a futile effort to discourage intermarriage, should be taken as a clear indication that being Jewishly committed and being accepting of intermarriage in one’s own life is not necessarily contradictory. The fact that the child of a non-Jewish mother is not allowed to attend Ramah camps is particularly counter-productive. That some such children and their parents want to attend Ramah camps should be recognized as a clear indication of potentially strong Jewish commitment in those children. If there is so much concern that not enough children of intermarriage become committed Jews, wouldn’t it make more sense to admit those children to a camping system that demonstrably produces committed Jews, instead of excluding them?

All of these negative responses to intermarriage and outreach are supported by an ideological position that I believe will weaken, not strengthen, the Jewish community. Mr. Cohen has posited the Orthodox on one end, written off the intermarried on the other, and then focused on the “critical Jewish middle”–those affiliated with the non-Orthodox movements–as if interfaith families do not constitute a significant part of that “middle,” which is plainly not the case. He suggests that acceptance of intermarriage causes Judaism to become “less centered on collective Jewish identity,” but his own important work, The Jew Within, shows that those in the Jewish “middle” are increasingly uncomfortable with tribalism, chosenness, and particularism for many reasons unrelated to intermarriage.

Given negative leadership attitudes towards intermarriage, it isn’t surprising that intermarried Jews have relatively infrequently joined Jewish institutions, engaged in Jewish learning or practiced Jewish ritual, as Mr. Cohen tiresomely emphasizes. But the increased affiliation with Reform synagogues suggests that welcoming interfaith families can positively impact those behaviors. In Boston, Combined Jewish Philanthropies has pioneered federation funding of outreach programs; in a recent evaluation, respondents reported increased Jewish involvement, synagogue membership, Jewish choices with respect to child-raising, and even conversion, after participation in the programs. I agree with Mr. Cohen that Jewish leaders of congregations, JCCs, federations and other agencies can rise to the occasion, innovate in practice and strategy, provide more Jews with personal meaning, and build meaningful Jewish communities. But responding positively to intermarriage by welcoming and including interfaith families will only enhance these transformative efforts.

 

Does “Interfaith” Still Matter?

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with Jodi Bromberg
published on the Jewish Education and Engagement blog of the Jewish Federations of North America; reprinted with permission

We are swimming in an ocean of intermarriage. So, why does “interfaith” still matter?

Terminology

Interfaith is a big term that to us doesn’t connote anything about religious practice. It doesn’t mean a couple practicing two faiths, or joining two faiths together, or raising children “both,” or practicing one faith and no faith, one and the other. “Interfaith” in the context of a couple simply means that one partner comes from one faith tradition or background and one comes from another. In the broadest sense, it simply means a family that includes one or more people who have a Jewish background and one or more from different faith backgrounds.

But there is, of course, more specificity, a spectrum of interfaith couples.

On one end there are couples with a Jewish partner and a partner from a different faith background who “might as well be Jewish” – i.e. not converted but Jewishly-engaged, not practicing another faith other than perhaps participating in a non-religious Christmas or Easter celebration. Some of those couples say they consider themselves a “Jewish family” or a “Jewish family with a partner who’s not” and not an “interfaith family.” But the fact that they still have extended relatives and families from different faith backgrounds creates issues that for many beg to be addressed.

On the other end of the spectrum there are couples who are practicing two faiths and raising children as “both”; these couples raise different issues about how Jewish communities will welcome and include them.

And, there are couples where neither of the partners are Jewish in the most traditional sense, where their own backgrounds include Judaism as well as other faiths and traditions.

Interfaith is a big term but it works, here, as an umbrella term. No term is better to describe couples and families with members that come from Jewish backgrounds and other faith traditions. We use it as what in the legal field would be called a “term of art,” meaning a word that has an acquired meaning that may not be clear from the term itself.

Most people understand the term “interfaith” with this richness and complexity. Our 2015 User Survey asked respondents what descriptive term they preferred. Of intermarried respondents, 64% preferred “interfaith couple/family” while only 21% preferred “Jewish”; there was almost no difference among younger respondents. This is how some of the 871 respondents explained their answers:

“Interfaith to me describes that there is the presence of someone with a background other than Judaism in the family. Even though my family identifies as Jewish, and my husband is a non-practicing Christian, we are still an interfaith family.”

“I prefer the term ‘interfaith couple or family’ because it does not prioritize one family over the other. No matter what preference my partner and I choose for our home (we plan to raise our children in a Jewish home), I still think equal respect for both cultures and families is important, and I think that term is the best suited for that.”

“I feel this [interfaith couple or family] is an appropriate label to describe many families. For me, that’s what we are. I’m Jewish but not really religious, my husband was raised Catholic and is not at all religious. We’re raising our son Jewish, but not involving much religion so it’s more of the traditions and culture. For us, that label fits.”

“I and my children are Jewish, my partner is not. Using interfaith acknowledges her experience and identity.”

“My family practices Judaism inside our home but my husband’s extended family is Christian. I’m not sure if interfaith fits right but it’s closer than anything else I’ve heard.”

These snapshots also demonstrate the variance in “interfaith” – it’s the right term, but it needs lots of nuance.

The Unique Needs of Interfaith Families

Like many people in relationships, many interfaith partners are exquisitely sensitive and protective of each other; they don’t want to put each other in a position where they will feel awkward, ignorant, embarrassed or uncomfortable. If we want interfaith families to engage in Jewish life, we need to be sensitive to how Jewish life is presented and whether adjustments or modifications need to be made.

So what does that mean?

It means that Jewish wisdom and ideas need to be presented in ways that emphasize content and lower boundaries. The Lippman Kanfer Foundation for Living Torah, for example, talks about “Jewish sensibilities,” emphasizing how Jewish wisdom and traditions can be applied to make people’s lives better, using Jewish language to talk about life, not just Jewish life.  The conversation applies not only to Jews but also to their partners from different faith backgrounds. It’s true that many of the Jews whom we hope will apply Jewish wisdom may not know much about their Jewish heritage, but the situation is qualitatively different for the partners from different backgrounds on whom Jewish wisdom has no inherent claim. How will the material be presented so it is accessible to them?

It means that we need to think through what Jewish language and concepts – peoplehood and connection to Israel, for example – mean for partners from different faith backgrounds and for those who are Jewish and something else. This is particularly relevant when we know that many young people want to express their spirituality but are not comfortable with existing religious worship as a vehicle to do so. How do we connect both Jews and their partners from different backgrounds to spirituality in Jewish settings? What new liturgies, formats and rituals do we need to weave into Jewish tradition? How do we become truly welcoming in spirit and practice?

It means that we need to listen more to those in interfaith partnerships and help them engage with each other. In our experience many interfaith couples want to discuss with others like themselves the particularly interfaith issue of how to talk about and make decisions about having religious traditions in their lives together. Some of the most impactful programs InterfaithFamily offers in local communities are workshops and meet-up groups for that purpose. We routinely get comments like this one from a Chicago participant, “I finally feel such a sense of community now getting to know other couples in the same family situation as ours.”

It means making highly transparent the opportunity to find Jewish clergy to officiate or co-officiate at their weddings and other life-cycle events – another particularly interfaith issue, since some rabbis are not permitted to officiate, and others who are permitted choose not to do so. We routinely get comments like these from officiation referral requesters: “I am very thankful for your assistance in making our wedding possible, as the rabbis whom I know would not officiate and I was feeling discouraged…” and “I think you provide an invaluable service that includes rather than excludes and I really want to express my thanks for that!”

It means we still have to be careful with our language. In InterfaithFamily surveys, the top-rated factor that attracted interfaith families to join Jewish organizations, at 79%, was explicit statements that interfaith families are welcome. It’s hard to accept but we continue to hear about off-putting comments that people in interfaith relationships hear in Jewish settings. We see a lot of room for professionals and organizations to be more aware of the messages conveyed by their language, communications and policies. Even the term “non-Jew” is off-putting to people from different faith backgrounds. Can we express a preference for in-marriage without making interfaith couples feel their relationship is less than ideal, second-best, “sub-optimal?” How can we talk about conversion in ways that make that wonderful personal choice accessible without indicating that partners from different faith traditions are embraced just as they are? Are we willing to include in Jewish community programs and organizations interfaith families who say they are “doing both”?

All of these are very interfaith family specific needs and issues that continue to merit attention. When we don’t pay attention, we shut doors.

So have we arrived at the point where “interfaith” doesn’t matter? Not yet.

The Future of Judaism: The Children of Intermarriage

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Published in PJ Library’s PROOF Magazine and reprinted with permission.

Since the Pew Report more than two years ago, it has been clear that the non-Orthodox Jewish community is increasingly an intermarried community. Seventy-two percent of non-Orthodox Jews who married since 2000 married someone from a different faith background. Half of young Jewish adults have one Jewish parent.

Anyone who wants to see Jewish traditions thrive into the future must recognize that it will not happen unless we seize the opportunity to engage interfaith families in Jewish life and communities.

Positive news on this front emerged in October 2015 with an important new study by the Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies at Brandeis, Millennial Children of Intermarriage, funded by the Alan B. Slifka Foundation. The main focus of the study is to show the positive impact of participation in Jewish activities during college (Birthright, Hillel, etc.) on millennial children of intermarriage.

But the study has important implications for Jewish experiences in childhood too. It reports that, for the most part,  the fact that their parents are intermarried does not have direct impact on the current behaviors and attitudes of young adults, but Jewish experiences in childhood do. If their parents expose them to Jewish experiences in childhood, then they are much more comparable to the children of inmarriage.

The study includes the important policy implication that “reaching more intermarried families with formal and informal educational opportunities for their children should be a priority. Such experiences launch children on a pathway to Jewish involvement in college and beyond.”

I believe that the goal of having children of intermarried families exposed to Jewish education is best served by a process that involves “trusted advisors.” These advisors would:

  • Build relationships with interfaith couples.
  • Offer assistance for interfaith couples (if needed) to find Jewish clergy officiants for their life cycle events.
  • Make opportunities for new couples and new parents to talk with each other and skilled professionals about how to make decisions about religious traditions.
  • Provide engaging resources and low-barrier educational programs for parents on raising young children with Judaism in interfaith families.

Furthermore, trusted advisors who are rabbis are in a unique position to overcome any negative experiences interfaith couples may have had, and make recommendations that couples connect with synagogues and other Jewish groups. If this process works, by the time children of interfaith families are ready for formal and informal education, their parents will be much more likely to choose Jewish education for them.

For many years we have surveyed people in interfaith relationships about what attracts them to Jewish life and communities. In order of importance, thousands have replied that they are attracted by explicit statements that interfaith families are welcome, inclusive policies on participation by interfaith families, invitations to learn about Judaism as compared to invitations to convert, the presence of other interfaith families, the offering of programming and groups specifically for interfaith couples, and officiation by rabbis at weddings of interfaith couples. Our surveys, and surveys by other Jewish organizations of which we are aware, show that interfaith couples still report experiences of negative attitudes and disinviting behaviors as barriers to their expanded connection to Jewish life. These findings provide a roadmap for what Jewish communities can do to increase engagement by local interfaith families.

For reasons not clear to us, the Millennial Children of Intermarriage study questions whether it is possible to dramatically alter the status quo regarding the childhood religious socialization of children of intermarriage. I believe that it is.

Will Jews Ever Normalize “Non-Jews” [a Term We Don’t Like to Use] and Marrying Them

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I had a very interesting day yesterday.

It started with a phone interview with a graduate student in journalism writing a story about Jewish-Muslim relationships. She had a Jewish parent and a Muslim parent herself, and was involved with a group of young Jewish-Muslim couples. She told me that some of them had decided to raise their children with Judaism and some hadn’t decided. I told her that at InterfaithFamily we are always interested in what influences some interfaith couples to get involved in Jewish life or not.

She said she thought that Jews were “exclusivist” and told me that one couple in the group approached a rabbi, I think she said about conversion, and the rabbi made a comment about Arabs and breeding that was so derogatory I don’t want to repeat it here. She couldn’t see it, but my jaw dropped, it was such an insulting and ignorant comment.

But sadly I shouldn’t have been surprised. I immediately thought of a good friend in the San Francisco Bay Area, not Jewish herself but active in her Reform synagogue, who reported last year that a woman at the synagogue said in her presence “we Jews are dumbing ourselves down by intermarrying.” My friend – herself at the highest level of anyone’s intelligence scale — was so shocked at how insulting the comment was that she couldn’t immediately respond. And then I thought of a survey that a major city federation asked me to analyze a year or two ago in which one couple said that at a Reform synagogue someone who learned they were interfaith said “maybe people like you would be more comfortable” at some other synagogue. It’s hard to believe that these comments are true – yet they keep on happening.

After the phone call I went to a terrific event at the Brown-RISD Hillel co-sponsored by the Genesis Prize, Hillel International and the Jewish Agency for Israel that featured Michael Douglas and Natan Sharansky talking about their Jewish journeys. I sat next to a man who asked me what I did and then told me his story. He grew up Orthodox, had a child with his first wife, got divorced, and then married a woman who is not Jewish. His wife doesn’t intend to convert but she keeps a strictly kosher home and his grandchildren call her “bubbe.” But after he re-married his synagogue told him he couldn’t have an aliyah (recite blessings before and after the Torah is read) any longer, so he left the synagogue.

This morning the Good Morning America team was talking about new variations of the Barbie doll and one of the correspondents said that her young children “don’t see color” meaning they don’t distinguish other children based on race. I’m not sure how widespread it is that people see people of other races as “normal.” I do think that young children see different constellations of parents as “normal;” I recently asked my 5-year-old grandson if one of “Joe’s” two mothers wasn’t a police officer, and I am quite sure he doesn’t think twice about his classmates who have two mothers or two fathers.

All of this made me wonder if Jews will ever see “non-Jews” and Jews marrying “non-Jews” as “normal.” At InterfaithFamily we try very hard not to use the term “non-Jew” which is why I put it in quotes; it’s off-putting and people don’t identify as “non-“ anything. We prefer to say “partners from different faith traditions.” But we keep on hearing people say “non-Jew” and it’s very use appears to support viewing the other as not “normal” – an Arab who breeds … or “non-Jews” who aren’t smart – as well as penalizing Jews who marry them.

The last thing that happened yesterday was hearing Michael Douglas tell his story again. As he said last night, and in a great story in the Jewish Week last week, Michael Douglas was told his whole life that he wasn’t Jewish because his mother wasn’t Jewish. When the people from the Genesis Prize came to him and said they wanted to award him the Genesis Prize as an outstanding Jew, he said “this is a mistake, I’m not Jewish.” But his son has gotten the family interested, and became bar mitzvah, and they traveled to Israel, and the Genesis Prize people very wisely recognized the importance of making a statement that the Jewish community needs to recognize and welcome people who are the children of intermarriage or are intermarried themselves but engaging in Jewish life.

Dare I say that the Genesis Prize being awarded to Michael Douglas is a statement that Jews need to not only recognize and welcome, but normalize intermarriage, the children of intermarriage, Jews who intermarry and most important, the partners from different faith traditions married to Jews? It was a ray of hope to end a very interesting day.

Positive News from the Millennial Children of Intermarriage Study

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Theodore Sasson and his colleagues at the Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies at Brandeis released this week an important new study, Millennial Children of Intermarriage, funded by the Alan B. Slifka Foundation.

The study reports that millennial children of intermarriage – born between 1981 and 1995 – are less likely than children of inmarriage to have had a range of Jewish experiences in childhood; as a result, they are less likely to engage in Jewish experiences (Birthright, Hillel, etc.) in college; and currently they are less likely to exhibit Jewish behaviors and attitudes as young adults.

The study reports that for the most part, the fact that their parents are intermarried does not have direct impact on their current behaviors and attitudes – but Jewish experiences in childhood do: If their parents expose them to Jewish experiences in childhood, then they are much more comparable to the children of intermarriage. This confirms previous research by Len Saxe that Jewish education, not parental intermarriage, is the key determinant of later Jewish engagement. It’s something we’ve also been saying for years in response to the studies that have found low Jewish engagement among interfaith families; if Jewishly-engaged interfaith families weren’t lumped in with all interfaith families, but evaluated separately, they would look much more like inmarried families, which makes the important policy question how to get interfaith families Jewishly engaged.

The main focus of the study is to show the positive impact of participation in Jewish activities in college on children of intermarriage. Indeed, college Jewish experiences “for the most part were more influential for children of intermarriage, nearly closing the gap on many measures of Jewish engagement.” We wholeheartedly support efforts to increase participation in Birthright, Hillel and other Jewish groups and experiences for children of intermarriage in college. This appears to be the trend. Since 1999, 300,000 North American young adults have gone on Birthright trips, of whom 75,000 are children of intermarriage; the percentage has increased from 20% in the early years to over 30% recently. Children of intermarriage are still underrepresented — half of all Millennial Jews are children of intermarriage, partly as a result of the high rate at which millennial children of intermarriage identify as Jewish. We’d like to see many more of them participate.

Some of the interesting statistical comparisons from the study are:

  • When asked what their parents told them about their religious identity, 41% said they were told they were Jewish only; 17% were told both; 18% were told it was their choice; 18% were not raised in any religion; 5% were raised in the other religion.
  • 44% of children of intermarriage had formal Jewish education, compared to 86% of children on inmarriage
  • 39% had a bar or bat mitzvah, compared to 84% of children of inmarriage, while 14% had Christian milestones
  • 89% celebrated Hanukkah, compared to 97%; 62% had a seder, compared to 86%; 25% went to Jewish religious services monthly, compared to 45%; 15% to 18% had a Shabbat meal or lit candles, compared to 42% to 46%
  • 86% celebrated Christmas with a meal or decorations, compared to 18%; 54% attended Christian religious services at least a few times a year, compared to 11%; 47% had a special Easter meal or observed Lent, compared to 6%.

The study includes important observations about the Christian experiences of children of intermarriage. The main point made is that Christian experiences in childhood were not indicators of participation in Jewish college activities. With respect to celebrating Christmas or Easter, “Home observance of holidays from multiple faith traditions did not seem to confuse these children of intermarriage” – another point we have been making for over the years with our annual December Holidays and Passover/Easter surveys. They recall holiday celebrations as “desacralized” – family events without religious content, special as occasions for the gathering of extended family. “Some indicated that celebration of major Christian holidays felt much more like an American tradition than tied to religion.”

Another important observation concerns how children of intermarriage react when their Jewish identify and authenticity is questioned. The study reports that children of intermarriage who identify as Jewish reject the idea that their Jewish identity is diluted or inferior and view their multicultural background as enriching, enabling an appreciation of diverse cultures and practices. “In interviews, children of intermarriage described being offended by reference to matrilineal heritage as necessary for Jewish identity. In many cases it was peers with two Jewish parents who challenged them. Even some with a Jewish mother reacted to this as an exclusionary boundary that has little to do with their experience of Jewish identity and living.” Interestingly, 40% of children of inmarriage described themselves as multicultural, compared to 52% of children of intermarriage.

Still another important observation is that for children of intermarriage, being very close to Jewish grandparents had a positive impact on many Jewish attitudes and behaviors in young adulthood. However, children of intermarriage by definition can have only one set of Jewish grandparents and as a result were less likely to have had a close relationship to Jewish grandparents; this was especially the case where their father was Jewish.

Finally, the study reports that Jewish experiences in childhood matter a great deal, and college experiences, especially Birthright, have a large impact on thinking it is important to raise children as Jews. In interviews, few children of intermarriage seemed to view being Jewish as a critical characteristic for their future spouse; the see themselves as proof that inmarriage is not a necessary ingredient for having a Jewish home or raising children as Jews. Many expressed a commitment to raising future children Jewish, or in some instance with exposure to Jewish traditions, regardless of whether they married someone who is Jewish. They often discussed the importance of giving children multicultural experiences and to sharing in cultural/religious tradition of their spouse.

The study includes a set of policy implications that for the most part emphasize the importance of increasing the exposure of children of intermarriage to Jewish college experiences. They also note that Jewish grandparents should be viewed as a critical resource, and programs should be designed to leverage their influence; that attention should be paid to providing alternative forms of preparation for bar or bat mitzvah; and that initiatives should reflect the sensibilities of contemporary children of intermarriage who view their mixed heritage as an asset and react negatively to ethnocentrism. “Jewish organizations can continue to adopt different approaches on patrilineality, but all Jewish organizations can encourage awareness of the strong feelings of Jewish identity and authenticity felt by many individuals who claim Jewish status by paternity alone.” We agree completely with all of these suggestions.

We believe that one key policy implication of the study fully supports InterfaithFamily’s work in particular with our InterfaithFamily/Your Community model providing services and programs in local communities. The study stresses that “reaching more intermarried families with formal and informal educational opportunities for their children should be a priority. Such experiences launch children on a pathway to Jewish involvement in college and beyond.” Our services and programs are designed to foster a process starting with helping couples find Jewish clergy officiants for their life cycle events, offering workshops for new couples and new parents on how to make decisions about religious traditions and then offering educational programs for parents on raising young children with Judaism in interfaith families, among other things. While this is happening, the Directors of the InterfaithFamily/Your Community projects, who are rabbis, are building relationships with couples and recommending that they get involved with synagogues and other Jewish groups. If this process works — and our efforts at program evaluation are starting to show that it does — by the time the children of interfaith families are ready for formal and informal education, their parents will be much more likely to choose Jewish education for them.

For reasons not clear to us, the study questions whether it is possible to dramatically alter the status quo regarding the childhood religious socialization of children of intermarriage. At InterfaithFamily, we are committed to working toward that end.

This post originally appeared on www.interfaithfamily.com and is reprinted with permission.

Why We Should Accept Rabbis Who Intermarry

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In a Forward editorial today, Jane Eisner says we should expect a rabbi to raise his or her children in a Jewish home, to maintain that home as the most sacred place in the Jewish eco-system. The fallacy in her argument is her assumption that intermarried rabbis would not do so. People who seek to become rabbis do so precisely because they are deeply committed to ongoing Jewish life – not only for themselves, but also for their communities, as the Reconstructionists realize. There is no reason to believe that intermarried rabbis would be any different; indeed, given the challenging process to become and then serve as a rabbi, it is absurd to do so.

When Eisner says we should expect a rabbi to partner with another Jew – that’s the tribalism that the Reconstructionists report alienates many younger progressive Jews and current or would be rabbinical students. If the goal is Jewish commitment to the home, synagogue and beyond, and if interfaith couples can demonstrate that commitment – as more and more do – then why is it necessary for Jews to partner with other Jews, beyond the assertion that “Jews should marry Jews” or worse, that “Jews are better.”

Interfaith couples resolve the “inherent complications” Eisner cites all the time, in ways that are conducive to ongoing Jewish engagement. There is no reason to think that intermarried rabbis would not do the same; in fact, there is more reason to think that they would. And because non-Orthodox Jewish communities are so heavily intermarried, intermarried rabbis would be excellent role models for those communities.

I’m glad to see Eisner say that “It is a propitious time to offer bold ideas to make Judaism more accessible and welcoming, to strengthen commitment among those born Jews and encourage others to join.” The Reconstructionists’ decision is precisely such a bold decision. Over the years I have talked with many would-be rabbis who lamented that because they were intermarried they could not attend any major seminary. I predict that being the first, the Reconstructionists will benefit from many excellent applicants and students.

This post originally appeared on www.interfaithfamily.com and is reprinted with permission.