Positive News from the Millennial Children of Intermarriage Study

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

Read the Rest »

Why We Should Accept Rabbis Who Intermarry

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

Read the Rest »

Vitality or Decline?

Today’s Statement on Jewish Vitality, advocating strategic responses to respond to the challenges of the Jewish future, is extremely disheartening for what it says and what it doesn’t say about interfaith families. Twenty-five years after continuity efforts began, it is still the case that most of our Jewish thought leaders, exemplified by those who signed

Read the Rest »

Bravo Reconstructionists!

The Reconstructionist movement has once again led the way to a more inclusive Judaism by taking the bold step to accept and graduate rabbinic students who are intermarried or in committed relationships with partners who are not Jewish. The main argument advanced against ordaining intermarried rabbis is that rabbis should serve as role models for

Read the Rest »

Choosing Love and Family at a B’nei Mitzvah

I’ve been to a lot of bar and bat mitzvahs in my life, but I’ve never been so deeply moved as I was on a recent Shabbat. My cousin, Nancy Sharp, who I’ve always adored, has experienced a life of tragic loss and re-found joy. Her husband, Brett, who I remember vividly as a most

Read the Rest »

Do Intermarried Jews Support Israel?

In an article in Ha’aretz, Michael Oren: New book meant to enlist American Jews to fight Iran deal, Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the US, has launched a PR tour for his new book “Ally,” which according to press reports addresses President Obama’s attitudes and positions towards Israel. One of Oren’s comments as reported

Read the Rest »

Mazel Tov, Michael Douglas – and Our Cause

Today was a very big day for everyone who wants to see interfaith families engage in Jewish life and community. As we previously covered in a post in January and another in April, the Genesis Prize Fund had announced that it was awarding its $1 million annual prize to Michael Douglas in order to emphasize

Read the Rest »

TransJewish?

Does the huge conversation about Rachel Dolezal, who resigned as president of the Spokane, WA, chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People after it was revealed that she identified as African-American while her parents are White, have any relevance to efforts to engage interfaith families in Jewish life and community? I’m

Read the Rest »

What the Term “Interfaith Family” Means

Today on eJewishPhilanthropy, Allison McMillan wrote an important piece, “Intermarried, Not Interfaith.” Her husband was an atheist when they met, had no religious connection to any holidays, is exploring Jewish traditions quite extensively, and has decided not to convert, in her words, “at least not right now.” She says their biggest issue is that they

Read the Rest »

Three Voices from the Conservative Movement

In March Rabbi Jeremy Kalmanofsky, a Conservative rabbi at Ansche Chesed in Manhattan, explaining “Why I Will Not Simply Accept Intermarriage,” wrote for the Forward that “Celebrating interfaith weddings… [would] diminish a sacred covenantal tradition, and risk making liberal Judaism into a jumble of traditional gestures that might please individuals but demand nothing from them.”

Read the Rest »