as for the Conservative movement, the Jewish Thelogical Seminary dropped the ban on admitting gay and lesbian rabbinical students in late 2006

Gosh, I should have looked that up! here is the story. I cannot imagine how I missed this, since I remember the previous decisions around this in the 1980s. I should also say that I’m aware that even though there is no consensus among Orthodox authorities in favor of Orthodox smicha for women, that there are a lot of Orthodox Jewish women who have found intermediate roles that are quasi-rabbinic, and there are also traditional roles for Jewish women that require teaching, authority or leadership.

It still leaves us with this weird paradoxical consensus about intermarriage though, doesn’t it?

You’re right that I should have corrected h.’s impression that Orthodox rabbis were accepting the idea of smicha for women, and also as far as I know the Conservative movement still doesn’t ordain out gay men or women as rabbis. The issue was more that there was political consensus to accept each other’s definitions, and an equally strong consensus not to allow officiants at intermarriages. That’s the thing we can all agree about? Yikes. I bet they don’t have that level of equanimity about the food at the meetings, you know?

I finally explored this website and found some of your jazzy writing. I’m finding the subjects you are dealing with engaging.

I think you meant Reform and not Orthodox in the following fragment: “I think it’s wonderful that the Orthodox and Conservative movements have finally recognized the”

Love, E.

I wouldn’t say that lesbianism is permitted in the Torah, so much as ignored. I’m not the best authority on sexuality and halachah, a fascinating topic and one worth reading about. I should probably make a links list for that, since it’s a tangentially-related topic and sure to come up sometimes. You could try this FAQ from the Orthodykes group or this bibliography with links of halachic perspectives on homosexuality from the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance.

I strongly doubt that the rabbi in this article intended to sound quite this judgmental of Jewish young adults for their lack of affiliation. It’s a problem with being quoted in journalistic articles–there’s always some distortion. It’s just that from the perspective of working here, we know that Jews who have intermarried, and their non-Jewish partners, are often willing or even eager to be connected to the Jewish community.

People from my Jewish community saw this post and asked me whether it implied that I was committing to getting to minyan on time. Um.

i am a regular reader of Rabbi Gellman’s The Spiritual State column in Newsweek. as he noted above, personal issues are not the sole cause of affiliation decline. financial ones play a huge portion in that as well. even committed in-married Jews sometimes feel that the cost of Jewish life is too high. while i don’t know Gellman’s direct stance on intermarriage, it sounds as though he is saying that it should not be entirely to blame on all our problems. it goes back to what Micah said about how people assume that in-marriage makes us Jewish. what makes us Jewish is ourselves, not other people. marrying a Jew doesn’t always translate to success and marrying a non-Jew doesn’t always translate to failure. there are in-married Jews who don’t attend shul ever (except on High Holidays) and there are intermarried Jews who serve on the board committees of their shuls. we don’t live in a perfect world, and we need to realize that if we want to make the Jewish community a thriving one.

as far as the idea that single post-college age adults are disconnected from Judaism, that is only partially true. many do participate in activities at JCC’s and Y’s as well as Birthright trips, study groups, and social action events while others read Jewish publications and attend concerts of Jewish musicians. what tends to disconnect them is not only the cost of programming, but also the singles events and how frustrating it can be to find Jews to date and marry. JDate costs money, and not everyone is going to want to pay the fees especially if the end results are unsuccessful. while i can’t speak for all Jews in their 20’s and 30’s, i can speak for myself: i am part of the community, regardless of whether i’m affiliated or not or whether i’m dating or married to a Jew or a non-Jew.