A look at the memoir by Scott Thorson that inspired the new HBO movie about his former lover, Liberace; the recent winner of Survivor; Mel Brooks, Kat Dennings, Josh Radnor, and more!
When my husband read an early draft of this essay, he asked, "Why doesn't her partner have to support our daughter? After all, they agreed to raise children as Jews." What does it mean to raise a Jewish child?
NEXT: A Division of Birthright Israel Foundation connects Birthright Israel trip alumni and their peers with meaningful Jewish living and learning opportunities nationally, locally and in Israel.
What were you taught about your LGBTQ heritage? Kick off Boston Pride Week with a retelling of the story of LGBTQ liberation using the Passover Seder model. June 1st, Boston, MA.
Supporting rabbis and cantors looking to engage interfaith couples and families in their communities and help them make a stronger connection with Judaism.
A great way for Jewish professionals and volunteers who work with and provide programming for people in interfaith relationships to locate resources and trainings to build more welcome into their Jewish communities; connect with and learn from each other; and publicize and enhance their programs and services.
Check out all the news posts by the G-dcast team! But don't forget to stop by the Network blog (written by InterfaithFamily staff) and the Parenting Blog too!
“Is it so outrageous for us to say that someone who is married to a Jew also has a place within the Jewish community?” asked Rabbi Neil Cooper of Temple Beth Hillel-Beth El.
An article in the Forward looks at the Conservative movement and its “hostile environment” for intermarried couples and families.
The question of what to do about intermarriage has long bedeviled the Conservative movement. As Jewish rates of intermarriage have climbed over the past few decades, the Reform movement has gained a reputation for openness, recognizing patrilineal descent and allowing rabbis to officiate at mixed marriages. On the other end of the spectrum, the Orthodox movement has disavowed intermarriage as a violation of Jewish law and a threat to Jewish continuity.
Conservative Judaism occupies a murky middle ground. Its Rabbinical Assembly prohibits Conservative rabbis from officiating at interfaith weddings, and even their presence at such a marriage can cause a stir. (Witness the fuss made over the presence of Arnold Eisen, chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary, at the reception after Chelsea Clinton’s wedding in July 2010. Although he is not a rabbi, Eisen had to publicly state that he had not attended the wedding, which had taken place during Shabbat.) When it comes to synagogue policies on welcoming intermarried couples, however, national guidelines are vague, if not completely outdated.
The R.A. is currently revising its policies regarding intermarriage. The last time it took an official position on the subject was in 1988, when it advised Conservative congregations to encourage non-Jewish spouses to participate but not to belong. A non-Jewish partner might be welcome at High Holy Day services, for instance, but he or she would be barred from membership.
So why an article now?
Temple Beth Hillel-Beth El, a Conservative synagogue just outside Philadelphia, made a tiny amendment to its constitution: It redefined household membership to apply to families with one Jewish parent as well as those with two.
Though the amendment impacted a small number of intermarried congregants — some 10 families out of a total of 720 — it spelled a philosophical transformation for the congregation that reflects broader changes in the Conservative movement writ large. Faced with the prospect of losing members because of a hostile environment for intermarried couples, Conservative congregations are providing membership opportunities for non-Jewish spouses. But in doing so, they are sometimes placing themselves in opposition to the national Conservative leadership. The United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, which represents the movement’s congregations, opposes membership rights for non-Jews.
Congratulations, Temple Beth Hillel-Beth El. I hope other Conservative synagogues take similar first steps. And, let’s hope that this is, in fact, but a first step…
Here in Boston, there was both a Dyke March on Friday night (complete with a Shabbat dinner picnic potluck) and the rainy Pride Parade on Saturday. Around North America (and many other regions of the world), parades and activities happen throughout the month in recognition of Stonewall and LGBTQ rights (achieved or desired).
Following the month’s trend, the Reform Judaism blog has a post today called “On Being Straight in the World’s First Gay Synagogue.” And though it’s up there to mark June as Pride month, I think there’s more to it than lessons on LGBTQ inclusion. The author, Maggie Anton Parkhurst, a member of Beth Chayim Chadashim, the world’s first gay synagogue (founded in 1972), writes:
We are diverse in more ways than sexual orientation. Yes, we are a Reform congregation, but our members have all sorts of Jewish backgrounds, from converts and Workman’s Circle yiddishists, through mainline Conservative to Orthodox yeshivahbochers. Despite these differences, we share a commitment to gender neutrality and equality at services, along with lots of singing.
We also represent Los Angeles’s varied ethnicities, which is abundantly clear when members read from the Book of Esther in fourteen different languages at Purim. Tolerance and embracing the stranger are BCC’s hallmarks, especially the latter, as everyone walking in on Shabbat receives a warm welcome. Even and especially people who feel excluded, or worry about feeling excluded, at other synagogues.
At first, all this diversity was uncomfortable compared to the suburban temple where our children grew up….
This is key. Whether welcoming individuals or families who are LGBTQ or interfaith, something as simple and easy as welcoming each and every person goes a long way. Have a greeter at the door to say “welcome” and “Shabbat shalom” to each person – be they regulars or newcomers. Every congregation – Reform or not, LGBTQ or not – can take a lesson from Beth Chayim Chadashim to ensure that all of us, strangers all, feel embraced and welcomed.
On Monday, the Federation of Jewish Men’s Clubs (of the Conservative/Masorti Movement) posted a video to YouTube explaining the importance of having a welcoming website. Aimed at synagogues, the video was publicized by an email sent out by the FJMC.
What’s interesting about the video (and email) is that it never explicitly states something like, “synagogue websites should say, ‘Our synagogue is welcoming of all families, including interfaith families and families of diverse backgrounds.’”
Instead, it suggests:
Your congregation’s website is your most important tool to attracting today’s Jewish family. Your website’s ‘welcome’ must be obvious. It needs to greet the visitor in a meaningful and sincere way. For example, if you’re welcoming interfaith families, children and adults with different ethnic backgrounds, or gay and lesbian families, words like ‘welcome,’ ‘open,’ and ‘diverse’ need to be prominent and obvious.
Buzz words aren’t enough. If you’re welcoming of “interfaith families, children and adults with different ethnic backgrounds, or gay and lesbian families,” say so! Use those descriptive words! The video shows interfaith families (a family standing in front of a Christmas tree and a menorah!) and shows that we should be welcoming to interfaith families (the word “interfaith” on a doormat!), but doesn’t say to use the words on the websites.
It seems like the Conservative Movement wants to be welcoming of interfaith families, but doesn’t think it can outright say so. But it can. And should.
This is a great start. I appreciate that the FJMC is making this effort, and we all know that making changes in synagogues can be a slow and arduous process, but… Let’s just take it a step further.
What do you think? Watch the video and leave a comment:
I’m in the midst of one reading one of the best book series I have read in a while, the Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson, which includes The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest. While the story is interesting, I didn’t think it had anything to do with interfaith families, making Jewish choices or encouraging a welcoming Jewish community – until I read the following paragraph:
(Officer) Bublanski felt an urge to talk with God about the case, but instead of going to a synagogue he went to the Catholic church … As a Jew he had no business being in a Catholic church, but it was a peaceful place that he regularly visited when he felt the need to sort out his thoughts. He found the Catholic church an equally good place for contemplation, and he knew that God did not mind. There was a difference, besides, between Catholicism and Judaism. He went to the synagogue when he needed company and fellowship with people. Catholics went to church to seek peace in the presence of God. The church invited silence and visitors would always be left to themselves.
While the novel was keeping my attention, this paragraph caught me by surprise and I started to think about the differences between walking into a church and walking into a synagogue–at least those I’ve walked into. My experiences in church have been primarily around Christmas services, weddings and family baptisms. Having come from a Conservative Jewish background, I was taken aback by the formality and what I initially took as coldness of a Catholic church worship service. You walk in quietly, respectfully, find a seat and sit. You don’t talk, you never yell and if you see someone you know, you may wave inconspicuously. Even though many times the entire church is full, you hardly hear a peep. During the service there is hardly any fidgeting and once the service is over everyone files out nice and orderly. There may be a bit of socializing afterwards, but most of the time you walk to your car and leave.
You couldn’t easily walk into a synagogue during a Friday night service, sit down and pray without everyone there turning their heads to see who just walked in. If you are new to the community, sometimes even before the service is over, someone–the president of the synagogue, the membership vice president and/or even the rabbi themselves — will come up and introduce themselves to you. They will ask you questions about who you are and what you are doing there. They may try to find out about your family, background, occupation and upbringing–and invite you to participate on a committee. It can be an overwhelming experience for a person who is used to walking into a place of worship, sitting down, praying and leaving.
Having had both experiences, Stieg Larsson’s description of the differences between Catholic and Jewish worship services hit home. While I enjoy the part of the synagogue community that welcomes people who walk in the door and the social aspect of services and events, I can understand how a person who has not had the typical synagogue experience could easily be put off by the welcome they get. Being aware of this is one way the Jewish community can be even more welcoming to interfaith couples. It’s not that a Catholic partner in an interfaith couple is not looking for company or fellowship, they just may need some time to get used to the differences.
A recent article by Neil Rubin in the Baltimore Jewish Times, “Conservative Judaism Thrives in Baltimore, But Troubled Nationwide,” makes an interesting point. One reason why the Conservative synagogues in Baltimore have more members than the Reform synagogues (which is the reverse of the rest of the country) is their emphasis on outreach programming.
Beth Israel was a pioneer in the Kiruv project, spearheaded by the movement’s Federation of Jewish Men’s Clubs. It strives to make congregations more welcoming for interfaith families. It has organized several training sessions for rabbis and volunteer leaders, one of which was hosted by the Pearlstone Conference and Retreat Center.
With that topic, just as with the national movement, local congregations struggle to adhere to Halachah (Jewish law) while being as open as possible.
“If you are intermarried, you can still live an integrated life and your family can still have a family membership, and the truth is there are many b’nai mitzvah meetings with families where I know the non-Jewish spouse better than the Jewish one,” Rabbi Goldstein said.
The rest of the article also emphasizes the ways that the Baltimore Conservative congregations work within halachah to reach out to formerly underserved Jewish populations. They have pushed people to keep kosher while at the same time creating programming to reach out to same-sex couples and their families. They also sound like great congregations in other ways: innovative pastoral counseling, continuity with old families in the neighborhood, good adult education.
We know from our work at InterfaithFamily.com that there are a lot of ways to reach out to interfaith families and a lot of profiles of those families. Not everyone wants the most liberal option–some want Conservative or Orthodox Judaism, and are disappointed when they can’t find welcoming congregations.
Among Reform congregations, which have grown precisely because of openness to interfaith families, some are popular with interfaith families even when the rabbi doesn’t officiate at interfaith weddings–because the congregation is intellectually challenging or provides great children’s Jewish education, or because they do social action.
There are many best practices in creating communities that are friendly to one population that also help outreach to other populations. Spirituality and adult education appeals to interfaith families–and also to many Jews in my generation. It’s not surprising to me that being open to interfaith families is one of the many factors that has made these Baltimore Conservative congregations vital.
A new article in Tablet, Big Tent Country by Marissa Brostoff, sheds some light on the issue of rabbinical schools accepting and ordaining intermarried rabbis.
We blogged about this issue three months ago, when New Voices published an important article, The Coming of the Intermarried Rabbi. At the time, I wrote that “there could be no better role model for interfaith couples than an interfaith partner who is so Jewishly engaged that he or she is a rabbi,” and that “Intermarried rabbis would be particularly inspiring to the interfaith couples who they served — and there is no reason they could not be inspiring to in-married couples as well.”
The Tablet article tells about Ed Stafman, a former attorney who intermarried, became active in a Reform synagogue, and eventually was ordained by the Renewal-affiliated Aleph Rabbinic Program, the only seminary that does not reject intermarried students outright. Rabbi Stafman will be installed next week as rabbi at Beth Shalom, a Reform synagogue in Bozeman, Montana.
What’s most interesting to me in the article are the comments by the members of Beth Shalom, which support the notion of an intermarried rabbi as a role model and inspiration for interfaith couples. Beth Shalom is by all descriptions a heavily intermarried congregation. One person in the hiring process said that Stafman’s being intermarried “might be a great asset because we’re so intermarried here that you might have a better understanding of the congregation.” Another said, “I think it will be very beneficial to those interfaith families in the community, and that they will really feel they have a home at Beth Shalom.”
Tis the season for matzah, wine and sometimes really bad food–unless you make one of our excellent staff recommended recipes, of course. As Passover approaches, so do the parodies of the holiday. Over the years I have seen many versions of the haggadah, the book of songs, stories and prayers read during the Passover seder (meal). This year it was taken to a new level when I was forwarded the Facebook Haggadah. For those of you on Facebook –this is hysterical. For those of you not on Facebook, you may find it slightly humorous but I have some other great links for you.
I found this video on YouTube and it made me smile. I’m particularly excited to share it with my non-Jewish husband who, while having attended many Passover seders over the past six years may find it useful in explaining what’s going on. (It’s after the cut.) Continue reading →
My nuclear family is going to my mother-in-law this year for Passover, and we are responsible for the child-friendly content of the second night seder. Even though both of us have worked in Jewish education in different capacities, we’ve never been in charge of leading a seder. We’ve always been participants at family seders that older family members led. This year we’re getting trained on doing it ourselves. I don’t think we’re going to be doing it alone, though, since my mother-in-law was a kindergarten teacher for many years and is sure to have a lot to say.
I have used JOFA’s materials in the past, when I was a bat mitzvah tutor for a girl who went to Orthodox day school–we used their booklet on Orthodox bat mitzvah options. I was impressed by the level of knowledge that JOFA educators thought a girl could achieve. (One girl in the booklet learned a chapter of Talmud and then had a traditional siyum, or completion party, as her bat mitzvah celebration. Wow.) Still, I wasn’t expecting JOFA to put out Passover resources that would be so useful for people in interfaith families. (I was also kind of surprised to get something from my mom from an organization with “feminist” in its name, since she usually prefaces the word “feminist” with the word “farbrenteh”– Yiddish for “burning”–but my mom is also a very experienced Jewish educator, and you can count on her to know good materials when she sees them.) It fits with my sense that we are all one big Jewish community and that there is continuity between secular Jews and halachic Jews, Orthodox and Reform, inmarried and intermarried, feminist and … not so invested in feminism. You know that if all of our families were leaving Egypt, we would have been redeemed, together.
I was really excited, in a silly way, to find out that Lieber’s Candy of Brooklyn makes kosher for Passover marshmallow bunnies and duckies–just like Peeps, only no gelatin! (I found the photo here–go give the kosher food detective some love!) I had this great idea to commission someone to make us an Easter basket with all kosher-for-Passover candy to photograph and feature on our site. In order to be kosher for Passover, candy can’t be made with corn syrup, and there are other kashrut rules about ingredients that apply to foods year-round that also apply on Passover.
I wasn’t completely kidding about wanting to blend Jewish food rules with Christian celebratory traditions. We have run one fabulous article by Teresita Levy, who hosts her Catholic relatives each year, Ay Vey, A Kosher for Passover Easter…With Recipes. Our families are increasingly diverse, and I believe with the right recipes and a little metaphoric WD-40 on your metaphoric door hinges, you can open your house to everyone.
I put out a call on Twitter to see if anyone wanted to photograph a kosher Easter basket, and one of my friends asked whether I had contacted Family Table, Greater Boston’s kosher food pantry. See, kosher for Passover Peeps are a cute idea, but there are a lot of Jewish families who can’t afford matzah. It’s a mitzvah, a religious obligation, to eat matzah, and it’s expensive.
Passover is a great time to think about feeding people. We say “all who are hungry, let them come and eat.” It’s emblematic of our freedom that we can host other people at our Passover seders. Right now, in the United States, there are people going hungry. If you are looking for a way to contribute, how about Project Mazon, a national Jewish hunger charity? If you clean your house for the holiday and get rid of leavened food, consider donating unopened packages to the local food bank. Let me know if you have other ideas that will celebrate Passover, Easter or the vernal equinox by making sure that all are fed.
I like any opportunity to show how Jewish culture can be integrated with other cultures and make a beautiful hybrid. I don’t know what culture should take responsibility for marshmallow Peeps, but I think you’ll join me in enjoying Peeps for Passover. Yes! The 10 Plagues, acted out by PEEPS! (No, no, Peeps are not kosher for Passover–for most kashrut authorities, they aren’t kosher at all, being made with gelatin–but Peeps as an artistic medium is clearly an idea whose time has come.) Ooh, there’s also a photo Moses Parting the Red Sea–of Peeps. We are living in some interesting times!
Let me know if you figure out anything visually clever to do with the Passover fruit slice candy. (They are
my five-year-old’s favorite candy, so probably we’re just going to eat them–though I was thinking about how awesome they could look in a bento-style kosher-for-Passover preschool lunchbox.) Jenn Forman Orth, who posted this photo on Flickr, says she doesn’t like them. (Is it bad that I hope you start debating the aesthetics of Easter and Passover candy in the comments?)
