Dear Rabbi Holtz:
As the Coordinator of the Half-Jewish Network, I read with interest your article on Joseph's wife for
www.interfaithfamily.comI would like to bring to your attention the fact that most adult children and grandchildren of intermarriage remain partially or fully excluded from the Jewish community, and I hope that you would be interested in doing something about it.
Joseph's children perhaps benefited from an era in which the lines were not so sharply drawn.
I have been advocating for the inclusion of descendants of intermarriage within the Jewish community for 26 years. But the most recent responses, including from liberal Jewish groups, suggest that they will only accept half-Jewish people who are raised as birth from Jews. That's not much progress in 26 years.
The remainder of the children and grandchildren of intermarriage -- two-thirds of whom are raised outside of Judaism -- have enormous trouble if they decide to affiliate as Jews. Often their phone calls and emails to organizations regarding conversion classes, study or shul attendance are ignored.
As you know, the situation for people like us in Israel is even worse.
I believe that the intent to exclude us will continue in the future -- a recent new young leaders survey done by Jewish communal institutions showed that 89 percent of all young people in Jewish communal leadership programs have two Jewish parents. I believe that half-Jewish people are being deliberately excluded from "feeder" programs to leadership in many settings.
I would be happy to discuss this with you at greater length.
Cordially,
Robin Margolis
www.half-jewish.net
