Reflections On Rabbbi Eric Yoffie Retirement

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Rabbi Eric Yoffie, the president of the Reform movement (Union for Reform Judaism), announced on June 10 that he would retire in two years. You can find the text of his prepared remarks on eJewish Philanthropy and articles with more analysis by Josh Nathan-Kazis in The Forward and by Jonathan Sarna also in The Forward.

I have to confess to having very mixed feelings about Rabbi Yoffie. He exercised leadership on many matters that I personally applaud greatly. I personally agree with positions he has taken on Israel, on domestic social policy and justice issues, on interfaith dialogue, on efforts to re-invigorate Reform Jewish worship services, on emphasizing text study, and more.

My problem relates to what I care about most both professionally and personally — engaging interfaith families in Jewish life. I find it somewhat telling that in his prepared remarks — which admittedly are not his final comments, those will come at and after the next URJ biennial in 2011 — that in discussing some of the future challenges facing the Reform movement, and some of the specific work that needs to be done in the next two years — there is no mention of engaging interfaith families.

The Reform movement’s record on outreach to interfaith families under Rabbi Yoffie’s leadership is disappointing. Prior to 2003, the movement had an outreach department with some headquarters staff and a half-time regional outreach director in each of its fourteen regions; all of these people were outstanding dedicated professionals who did amazing work helping congregations welcome interfaith families and attract them to Jewish life. In 2003, the movement eliminated most of the positions, reportedly because of financial pressures. InterfaithFamily.com initiated a campaign that helped to preserve some of the positions.

Then in 2009, the URJ did away with its regions and the remaining regional outreach positions, to be replaced by four outreach specialists who, as talented and dedicated as they are, are stretched awfully thin to serve all 900 Reform congregations. The Reform movement’s outreach department and initiative, once truly a jewel among the movement’s many programs, is in a sadly reduced state.

To be fair, we publicized excerpts from Rabbi Yoffie’s 2005 biennial speech — and those speeches are where the movement’s most important efforts are announced — highlighting two parallel initiatives, which the URJ still supports,  to welcome non-Jewish spouses on the one hand, and to respectfully encourage conversion on the other. But program materials are one thing; staff whose job it is to promote and help with use of the materials is much more significant. I believe that the outreach department was a very “sellable” program – that funding could have been attracted for it – and that the movement’s leadership under Rabbi Yoffie’s direction did not give it the priority it deserved.

The URJ’s leadership may think that the Reform movement doesn’t need to do any thing more to attract interfaith couples and families. In the New York Jewish Week, Gary Rosenblatt reported that Rabbi Yoffie said that “his movement is the largest Jewish denomination because it has an “open door, inclusive” policy. ‘We are the place for the intermarried, gay or lesbian, and disabled to explore Judaism.’” I would argue that the Reform movement and Reform synagogues could do a great deal more to attract and welcome people in interfaith relationships – and that if they did, they would see membership increases that would help to alleviate the financial pressures that apparently continue to plague the movement and its synagogues.

Josh Nathan-Kazis reported on his interview with Rabbi Yoffie the following

As for the growing impact of intermarriage among American Jews, Yoffie said that his movement is handling the challenge well. He said that the movement has “not an ounce of regret” for its 1983 decision to consider the children of Jewish fathers and non-Jewish mothers to be Jewish, which represented a break with Jewish tradition.

Regarding studies that have found a lack of affiliation on the part of many children of intermarried couples, Yoffie said, “We’d like to point out that what that means is at a time when there’s an enormous amount of intermarriage, we’re getting a third of these people into synagogues… Imagine if we didn’t have the [patrilineal descent] decision and how many of them would be in any Jewish framework. I suggest it would be far lower.”

I’m glad to see Rabbi Yoffie re-affirm the patrilineal descent decision — and want to respectfully suggest that the number of intermarried couples that would be in a Jewish framework would be far, far greater if the Reform movement gave engaging them the priority it deserves.

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

Edgar Bronfman In the News

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edgarbronfmanEdgar M. Bronfman, one of InterfaithFamily.com’s most important supporters, has been in the Jewish press again recently: j. the Jewish news weekly of Northern California re-printed an article about him from the Canadian Jewish News.

Mr. Bronfman, who is approaching 80, occasionally speaks publicly about his book, Hope, Not Fear. We published an excerpt from the book and blogged about it back in 2008 when it first came out.

The recent j. article includes many pithy, to-the-point observations by Mr. Bronfman:

I’m not advocating intermarriage. What I’m saying is that intermarriage is here. It’s here to stay. Let’s make it work for us, rather than against us.

Being Jewish is a choice today, not a condition … The problem is not that Jews are falling in love with non-Jews, it’s that Jews are not falling in love with Judaism.”
Jewish law [should be changed] to recognize paternal, as well as maternal, lineage…. Patrilineage was the norm among Jews until the 12th century and the time of Maimonides. We don’t have to worry about keeping the bloodlines pure nowadays. We have DNA.

bronfmanbookcoverIn 2008, at the General Assembly of the United Jewish Communities (now the Jewish Federations of North America) both Mr. Bronfman and his son Adam spoke out in favor of inclusivity. In a blog post at the time, I reported that Mr. Bronfman said in his speech that the Jewish community needed to stop regarding intermarriage as the “enemy” while Adam urged the Jewish leaders in attendance to consider the potential for positive Jewish involvement by interfaith families.

Long before his book, Mr. Bronfman was a leading advocate for including interfaith families in Jewish life. In 2004 we reprinted an article about him from the Jerusalem Post, and the article title says it all: Bronfman: Children of Intermarriage Are Also Jews. We ran Sue Fishkoff’s fascinating interview of Adam Bronfman in 2007.

I hope both of the Bronfmans will continue to lead the effort to welcome interfaith families to Jewish life.

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

A Jewish Leader Who “Gets It”

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I hardly need to say that intermarriage is not a popular topic. I am often frustrated when Jewish leaders do not agree with me that engaging interfaith families in Jewish life is an issue of such overriding importance for the liberal Jewish community that it should be talked about openly and even aggressively.

Shortly before Passover this year, I had one of those frustrating meetings. When I arrived home later that day, I found in my mail the Passover message to donors to the Boston federation, Combined Jewish Philanthropies from Barry Shrage, CJP’s president.

The contrast in attitudes was striking.

In a two-page letter to people who are certainly key constituents of his federation, Barry Shrage explicitly brought the issue of engaging interfaith families directly into the spotlight. Here is how what he said appeared in the digital edition of Sh’ma:

How will this year’s seder be different from all others? Who will sit at our seder? What questions will they ask and what stories will we tell? As we gather our families and friends around the table, many of us will be sitting with children raised in interfaith households and young adults who have returned from Taglit-Birthright Israel trips to Israel. Those children and grandchildren may be asking surprisingly spiritual questions. (A recent study found that the next generation of Jews is actually more spiritual than the last and that the children of intermarriage are the most spiritual of all.)

Hopefully in the future, statements from Jewish leaders, that recognize the reality and presence of people from interfaith relationships in the Jewish community, and say something positive about that reality, will become increasingly more common.

By the way, Barry’s answer to his question is extraordinary too, and well worth remembering:

  • In a time that lacks vision and prophecy and that yearns for meaning, our stories are carrying an ancient faith in an ancient God so that our children and grandchildren will have spiritual options to fill their lives with light and joy.
    • In a time of greed and selfishness, our stories are part of an old – a very old – tradition of caring for strangers – love of the poor and oppressed – and responsibility for widows and orphans, the elderly and handicapped.
    • In a time of forgetfulness, our stories are part of a living chain of learning and literature in the world, inheritors of an ancient and hauntingly beautiful culture.
    • In a time of anomie and loneliness, our stories are imbued with a thirst, and we maintain a commitment to creating community and providing a sense of belonging.
    • In a time of rootlessness and alienation our stories are connected to a religious civilization with a 3500-year-old history and an infinite future and the ultimate responsibility for the betterment of humankind in the name of the God whose story is at the heart of our existence.

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

Rabbi David Gruber and Julie Wiener

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We were pleased to see our friend Julie Wiener devote her new column in the New York Jewish Week to highlighting our friend Rabbi David Gruber.

Aside from his fascinating, perhaps unique personal journey – an Orthodox trained and ordained rabbi who now officiates and co-officiates at weddings for interfaith couples – I know Rabbi Gruber is an extraordinary kind person based on my own discussions with him. I’m glad that his experience with InterfaithFamily.com’s Jewish Clergy survey
and talking with Rabbi Lev Baesh, the director of our Resource Center for Jewish Clergy, helped him develop his own practice.

You can find out more about Rabbi Gruber from his profile on our Network. And you can find out about his conversation with former President George W. Bush in an article he wrote for us just two weeks ago: Hail to the Chiefs: How I Officiated at a Wedding in the Presence of Two Presidents, and what it’s like to officiate a wedding on MTV in Lights, Camera, Mazel Tov–How I Officiated a Wedding on MTV.

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

Something Positive About Intermarriage, For a Change

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Intermarriage has been trashed a lot in the past few weeks and we’ve been doing a lot of de-bunking: first of the idea that intermarriage is the cause of young American Jews’ distancing from Israel, second that interfaith marriages are more likely to fail. I thought it would be nice to end the week with a positive story.

Last weekend I was trying to make a dent in my reading pile and I found All the Obama 20-Somethings in the April 26 Sunday New York Times Magazine. One of the young people mentioned is Eric Lesser, 25, David Axelrod’s special assistant. I’m reading along about how Eric lives in a group house with some other people who work in the White House, and it occurs to me that his name is familiar.

Sure enough, back in 2005, when he was a student at Harvard, Eric wrote for us about his experiences on a Birthright Israel trip: Integrating My Identity in Israel. Then in 2006 he wrote one of the very best articles we’ve ever published – and the title conveys it all – How My Italian-American Catholic Mother Strengthened My Jewish Identity.

I continued reading the Times Magazine article, and was moved and heartened by this:

Eric Lesser looked out over the containers of Thai carryout, the bottles of wine and the Shabbat candles. “Should we do Shalom Aleichem?” he asked, and the whole table began singing a warbled but hearty version of the song that welcomes Shabbat. In Lesser’s group house of Obama staff assistants, Friday-night Shabbat dinners have become something of a ritual, a chance to relax and spend a few hours with friends, reflecting on the week.… At the end of every Friday dinner, the tradition is that everyone goes around the table and says something from the past week for which they’re grateful.

I wish the folks out there who are trashing intermarriage would stop and consider this example of a young product of intermarriage leading Shabbat dinners for his housemates. There are hundreds and thousands of similar examples of positive Jewish engagement by interfaith families and the young adults who grew up in them; this may just be the first one we know about with a White House connection. I can’t help but think that there would be a lot more, if intermarriage were viewed as an opportunity and not something to be demeaned.

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

Are Interfaith Marriages Really Failing Fast?

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I wish Naomi Schaefer Riley had consulted with us, or at least looked at the resources available on InterfaithFamily.com, before the Washington Post published her story, Interfaith marriages are rising fast, but they’re failing fast too.

My main complaint about the article is that it cites no compelling evidence whatsoever to support the thesis of the title that interfaith marriages are failing fast. It is a common perception, to be sure, that interfaith marriages fail at rates higher than same faith marriages, but I have never been able to find reliable evidence to that effect. In addition to citing a 1993 paper (but not any data in it comparing inter- and intra-faith divorce rates), Riley says that “According to calculations based on the American Religious Identification Survey of 2001, people who had been in mixed-religion marriages were three times more likely to be divorced or separated than those who were in same-religion marriages.” Who made the calculations? Are they published some place – and available to be scrutinized?

It seems that Riley’s article was prompted by the notorious Reyes case in Chicago. We’ve blogged about that extreme case several times. It’s not fair to generalize to all interfaith marriages, however, from a case where the husband converts to Judaism, the couples splits up, and the husband then takes their child to church trailed by TV cameras.

Last August we published a report on a study by Janice Aron, Interfaith Marriage Satisfaction Study Yields Answers and More Questions. Her conclusion:

The study found absolutely no difference in marital satisfaction between people who were married to partners of the same faith, and people married to partners of a different faith.

This is an interesting finding because it seems to herald a new trend in the psychological research in this area. There is a body of research supporting the idea that homogamous marriages tend to be happier than heterogamous ones, but some recent research like mine finds no difference. Perhaps this is the trend of the future. I am hoping it means Americans are becoming less suspicious about, and more accepting of, other religious views. Perhaps the more heterogamous our society becomes, the more we are forced to re-examine our assumptions about others.

It is commonly reported that the overall divorce rate in the United States is 50%. Young people are doubtless aware of that, but thankfully they continue to marry. As a practical matter, which Riley recognizes, young people in love are probably not going to be dissuaded from pursuing their interfaith relationships by calculations of a higher risk of divorce. I think it is unfortunate, though, to have yet another negative pall cast over intermarriage.

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

Young American Jews, Israel, and Intermarriage

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The Gaza flotilla incident overshadowed the controversy in the Jewish media over Peter Beinert’s recent essay, The Failure of the American Jewish Establishment. I understand Beinert’s central thesis to be that young American Jews feel conflict between their liberalism and Zionism because of the policies of the Israeli government towards the Palestinians, resulting in less support for Israel. This thesis makes sense to me and is consistent with what I’ve heard among an admittedly small sample of young Jews. I wasn’t planning on commenting on the essay, because Beinert himself doesn’t talk about intermarriage as part of the phenomenon. But that changed and I feel compelled to comment.

Foreign Policy got eight “experts” together, including Steven M. Cohen, and he reiterated his view that the “primary driver” undermining Israel attachment for young Jews is not Israeli policies, but instead is intermarriage.  “Younger Jews are far more likely to marry non-Jews, and the intermarried are far less Israel-attached than those who marry fellow Jews — and even non-married Jews. Intermarriage reflects and promotes departure from all manner of Jewish ethnic ‘groupiness,’ of which Israel attachment is part.”

My fundamental problem with Steven Cohen’s research reports is that he lumps all intermarried people together and compares them to all in-married people. Because a not insignificant percentage of intermarried people are, sadly, not engaged Jewishly, the comparison invariably shows less Jewish engagement among the intermarried. But if one looks at intermarried people who are engaged Jewishly, the differences are much reduced. This framing has a very serious policy consequence. If one thinks of the intermarried as not Jewishly engaged, why try to engage them? But if one thinks of Jewishly engaged intermarrieds as seriously engaged, why not do more to try to engage more of them?

Fortunately there are other leading sociologists and demographers who have taken issue with Cohen’s approach. In this case, Leonard Saxe and Theodore Sasson from Brandeis, writing in Tablet, credit Beinert’s thesis:
“When [Beinert] writes that under the Netanyahu government lines are being crossed and Zionism increasingly seems at odds with liberalism, he expresses the sentiments of an influential segment of the American Jewish intelligentsia. The tension between American Jewish liberalism and the policies of the current Israeli government is real, and the prospect of substantial alienation in the future cannot be dismissed.”

Saxe and Sasson refer in their piece to their earlier paper, American Jewish Attachment to Israel: An Assessment of the “Distancing” Hypothesis, in which they question Cohen’s overall approach and in particular write that “there is some evidence that Israel attachment actually increased among the intermarried during the period 2000-2005, perhaps an indicant of the strengthening Jewish education of this group.”

InterfaithFamily.com conducts two surveys a year around Passover/Easter and the December Holidays. In our 2009 Passover Easter survey we asked about attitudes towards Israel. We concluded that the Jewish partners feel as connected to, and are as supportive of, Israel as American Jews in general; their non-Jewish partners are nearly equally supportive of Israel, but feel much less connected – a not surprising difference, that we suggested could be overcome by sponsoring subsidized travel to Israel for interfaith couples and families. Of course if you follow Steven Cohen’s logic you would say that would be a waste of money.

I particularly object to Cohen’s use of the term “primary driver.” What exactly does that mean? It sounds like it means that intermarriage causes distancing from Israel. How would that work? A young Jew changes his or her attitude toward Israel because he or she marries someone who is not Jewish? Isn’t the opposite effect as likely to occur – the non-Jew who may previously have not had any reason to feel attachment to Israel suddenly loves someone who does? I have contended in the past that intermarriage may in fact increase the support for Israel among Americans. If the Jewish partner feels attachment to Israel, then not only the partner who is not Jewish, but also the non-Jewish parents and siblings of that partner, now have a reason to care about Israel that they didn’t have before — a close family member who cares about Israel.

Usually sociologists and demographers take great pains to distinguish between causation and correlation. It is rare – if it ever happens – for a sociologist to identify a causative factor of an attitude or behavior. But saying intermarriage is a “primary driver” for distancing from Israel sounds exactly like that.

I believe that “liberal” Jews – in the sense of non-Orthodox — do have serious issues with Israeli policies that they feel conflict with their “liberal” – as in political – views. Blaming this problem on intermarriage is counter-productive, destructive, and a serious mistake for any Zionist who like me strongly supports the need for a Jewish state in Israel.

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

Israel Is Being Unjustly Criticized

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Like many others, I have been distressed this week by recent events in Israel. This blog is meant to address issues relating to interfaith relationships; the ins and outs of Israeli government policies, how best to resolve the conflict with the Palestinians, etc. — those are issues on which we don’t claim expertise and on which InterfaithFamily.com as an organization does not take a position.

That being said, I believe that the criticism of Israel’s enforcing the Gaza blockade has not been fair, and the perception of Israel has been skewed as a result — including possibly among the interfaith couples and families about whom we are concerned. US Representative Barney Frank (D-MA) had a compelling exchange with Chris Matthews on yesterday’s Hardball on MSNBC which I want to share with our audience. The interview is pasted in below; it can be found at this link, starting at approximately 4:00 into the segment.

Rep. Frank Interviewed on MSNBC
June 2, 2010

MATTHEWS: Let’s turn now to Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank, who is chairman of the House Financial Services Committee.  Congressman Frank, what do you — this is — how do you find objective truth in the Middle East?

FRANK:  You know, first of all, we ought to be very clear that the blockade has not simply been an Israeli blockade. It’s been an Israeli/Egyptian blockade. And I think that’s very important, because I do think the Israelis have a legitimate concern about being unfairly blamed and double standards.

By the way, I don’t remember quite so much worldwide outrage when the North Koreans sank a South Korean submarine and 46 people were killed. There are people now very upset about Israel on a much more ambiguous situation as to what could and should have happened.

We had an unprovoked attack by North Korean on a South Korean submarine, 46 people killed, and a great deal of silence and — and — and equivocation.

Look, you have this fundamental problem with Israel, for them. They gave up Gaza voluntarily. I was one of those who for a long time was arguing they should. What happened was, Gaza was then occupied by a group of people who think Israel shouldn’t exist and who are in fact on our terrorist list for good reason.

Now, what you then have is a blockade. And the argument is, well, there were no weapons in this shipment. But a blockade that allows some things in and not others has to maintain control over the ports of entry, so you can know what is in or not.

Given that, I think it was irresponsible of the pro-Hamas people who organized this set of ships to go in there to do that, and obviously understood the potential for violence. That does not mean that everything the Israelis did in this situation was right. When military people are in a situation where they have to use force, as they had to do here, not everything will be done well. Not everything will be done correctly. I do agree it would be in Israel’s interest to have an independent inquiry, appointed by Israelis.

By the way, the Israeli government, the Israeli judiciary, has a very good record of holding the Israeli government to account. The Israeli Supreme Court has been much tougher on the Israeli government on security matters than the U.S. Supreme Court has been on our government, or the French or the others have been.

MATTHEWS: I know.

FRANK: So I think in interest to have — to look at specifics. But the context is relevant, that Egypt and Israel both said, look, we have terrorists running a piece of territory here. We do not trust them to be peaceful. And we’re going to monitor what goes in.

I agree things could be done better. But in this particular situation, I think it would be in everybody’s interest for there to be an independent inquiry, which Israel has shown itself capable of having internally, to figure out who did what, when. But the basic concept — I do believe — put it this way, if Hamas were in Canada, America would have a tougher blockade than Israel has.

MATTHEWS: I hate it, congressman, when I completely agree with somebody, but I do. The only question to add to that is what’s the international community, the smart people in Europe that are watching it — don’t they see the movies we see? Don’t they see, in this particular situation, the Israeli IDF guys getting beat up on that ship? Don’t they see it?

FRANK: One more thing, Chris — and it’s true, this is causing — the blockade hurts people in Gaza. And by the way, again, it was an Egyptian/Israeli blockade. So let’s be clear. The Egyptians, for their own reasons of self-preservation, were doing this. Blockades hurt people. The blockade of North Korea hurts North Koreans.

I remember when we were fighting Apartheid in South Africa, being told by Ronald Reagan, who vetoed the sanctions bill — you remember this, Chris. And we overrode Ronald Reagan’s veto to impose tough sanctions, economic, on South Africa. And the Reaganites said to us you’re hurting the poor black people of South Africa. And Nelson Mandela later stood in the Capital of the United States and said, thank you for doing that, because you need to put pressure on them.

So again, if the blockade can be done better, I’m not an expert on that. Yes, humanitarian aid should get in. Food should get in. The Israelis say it has been. If there’s a dispute there, let’s work to make — to increase it. And an inquiry — look and say what we’ve done with the American military. You put military people in a position where they have to use force and it’s not going to be done perfectly.

But on the fundamentals, on the right to a blockade, again, we have to go back to the fact this doesn’t happen in the West Bank. It happens in Gaza because a terrorist group that’s opposed to Israel’s very existence took physical control from the elected government at the time, the president, who won the parliament and have used it as a base of attacks.

MATTHEWS: You know what? I think when you let the Europeans judge Israel, you’re not letting them be judged by a panel of their peers. It does seem a totally prejudicial situation. Go ahead, one last thing.

FRANK: About Turkey and Iran, unfortunately — and getting sanctions against Iran is very important. I’m willing to show a little slack to the Chinese for that that. But the Turks and the Brazilian just undermine our efforts to deal with Iran a couple weeks ago. So turkey can’t blame this, and the Turks should not have been allowing themselves to be used in this situation by Hamas. But the Turks can’t blame this for the fact that they’ve already been out of sync with us on Iranian sanctions.

MATTHEWS: Well, they’ve got an Islamic government. Thank you so much, Islamist government, perhaps. Thanks you very much, Congressman Barney Frank of Massachusetts.

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

Memorial Day, 2010

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Today is Memorial Day and I want to honor my father-in-law, Don Bosworth. Don is a World War II veteran and was a prisoner of war in Germany. He lives in assisted living and has been pretty sad since his wife Jean, my beloved mother-in-law, died in 2005.

Back in the 1970’s Don and Jean bought a small cottage in a very beautiful spot – Cape Porpoise harbor, part of Kennebunkport, Maine, a town most known as the summer residence of George H. W. Bush.  Kennebunkport is still a small town and they still put on a Memorial Day parade. It starts in Dock Square, the center of town – I remember one year when President Bush attended – and then the participants drive a few miles over to Cape Porpoise Square and the parade is repeated.

Most years on Memorial Day my wife and I would be in Maine, where we are today, and would walk down the street to Cape Porpoise Square to see the parade. More important than the middle school band and the baton twirlers and fire engines, a small group of increasingly aging, mostly male, veterans march a short distance in formation.

I came of age during the Vietnam War and never served myself. Most of the conflicts in my lifetime have not been popular. But I always feel it is important to be at the parade and to honor not only the veterans, but also those who currently serve in our armed forces. In large part it’s because of my father-in-law’s sacrifices during the war.

Despite all of its problems and shortcomings, we live in a great country. There may be uncertainties about more recent conflicts, but those who serve made and make it possible for all of us to enjoy our many freedoms – including religious freedom.

For many years I would get upset at the Memorial Day parade because there was always an invocation and benediction and invariably the priest or minister would conclude his or her prayer “in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord.” There were so many times I wanted to write down the clergy person’s name and write to him or her and point out that not everyone in attendance was Christian – but I never did. Finally a few years ago the references to Jesus ended.

A couple of years ago the State of Maine created a small Prisoner of War museum and invited all of the living ex-POW’s to attend the opening ceremony. My father-in-law is extremely modest and unassuming and didn’t want to be honored, but we persuaded him to go. It was a moving sight to see the 15 or so mostly WWII vets there, most using walkers. The chaplain who gave the invocation prayed in the name of Jesus, which for some reason upset me much more than usual. When the ceremony ended I went up to him and said with some vehemence that my father-in-law wasn’t a prisoner of war so that he could pray in a public ceremony in the name of Jesus – he was a prisoner of war so we would all have freedom to pray as we choose and without public favoring of any one religion over another. The poor chaplain was visibly taken aback – he actually said that some of his best chaplain colleagues were rabbis – but I’m pretty sure he got the point.

It’s because of the freedoms and pluralism and tolerance of America that Jews are no longer restricted to themselves and we have the challenge and great opportunity that intermarriage presents to the future of Jewish life. I’m pretty sure that my father-in-law wasn’t thinking during his army days that his service would contribute to the conditions where I could become his son-in-law. But I’m very glad it did, and I want to be sure to honor him today.

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

More Bad Attitude from Israel

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Back in October, the Jerusalem Post published an op-ed I wrote, What Israelis need to know about intermarriage in North America. As I blogged then, “it is critical for Israelis to know that intermarriage does not necessarily lead to loss of Jewish identity and affiliation; that many interfaith couples and families are engaging in Jewish life; and that intermarriage has the potential to increase support for Israel in America.”

Apparently, the Prime Minister of Israel, Benyamin Netanyahu, either didn’t read my op-ed, or if he did, the message didn’t register. In February, Prime Minister Netanyahu spoke at the Jewish Agency for Israel’s Board of Governors meeting. Our friends at eJewish Philanthropy quoted him as saying that one main palpable challenge to the Jewish future is “the loss of identity – the loss of identity through assimilation or through intermarriage or through both is the greatest toll-taker of Jewish numbers in the last half-century.”

Paul Golin, the associate executive director at the Jewish Outreach Institute, had an interesting op-ed in the New York Jewish Weeklast week. As Paul aptly says,

The suggestion that intermarriage also represents absorption beyond recognition into the larger culture is an affront to the literally hundreds of thousands of households where one parent happens to be Jewish that are currently raising Jewish children. If intermarriage means the same thing as assimilation, there wouldn’t be intermarried members of synagogues, children of intermarriage on Birthright Israel trips or intermarried leaders of Jewish communal organizations.

Continuing to group “intermarriage and assimilation” into a synonymous phrase pushes away the intermarried families already among us.

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