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RESOURCE PAGES Print entire issue CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Web Magazine ARTICLE ARCHIVE Secular Judaism CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA Issue 208: May 8, 2007 BLOGS Sponsored by the Jesse & Julie Rasch Foundation DISCUSSION BOARDS
NEWS AND ADVOCACY
ABOUT IFF
PRESS ROOM FEATURED ARTICLES STORE Can You Raise a Child Without God? Find By Ken Burk powered by FreeFind The short answer: Yes. The long answer: It's more challenging without the stirring narratives of traditional religion. Read More
Of Shalom and Om By Heather Lazar A Jewish woman married to a Hindu man finds the universal lessons in Jewish holidays. Read More
Interfaith Families and Secular Featured Judaism Partners/Funders/Links By Rabbi and Cantor Judith Seid In a Secular Humanistic congregation, the children of intermarriage celebrate both of their parents' heritages equally. Read More Login
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ALSO IN THIS ISSUE Password: More Articles on Secular Judaism
Our Secular Humanistic Seder By Deborah Freeman Not Signed Up? Find Out More.
Have you heard of the fifth child, the one who no longer sits at the Passover table? "Mazel Tov" Instead of "Oy Vey" Interview by Ronnie Friedland
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Rabbi Adam Chalom asks only one question of interfaith couples who ask him to marry them: Do you love each other?
Books
Judaism, Please. Hold the Deity. By Jesse Tisch
In God-Optional Judaism, Judith Seid takes disbelief seriously. Avoiding Jewish "Nothingness" By Michael Felsen
Secular Jewishness for Our Time traces the evolution of secular Judaism--from the socialist Yiddishkeit of the early 20th century to the multicultural activism of the 21st.
News
Is The Popularity of Jewish Culture Sustainable? By Chanan Tigay
Young people are responding to Matisyahu, Heeb and Guilt & Pleasure. But will it get them into synagogue? Rabbi Field Embraces "Jews on the Edge" By Andrea Jacobs
The head of Denver's Judaism Your Way provides alternative Jewish experiences to those outside the mainstream.
From Our Article Archive
Why We Call Them Intercultural Weddings: A Secular Humanistic Jewish Approach By Rabbi Miriam Jerris
There's no such thing as a by-the-book secular wedding.
Arts and Entertainment
Interfaith Celebrities: Five Beautiful Women, A Violinist and One Caveman By Nate Bloom How many interfaith celebs made People's 100 Most Beautiful People in the World? Plus, the Geico caveman's path to Judaism.
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Home > Article Archive > Spirituality > Interfaith Families and the Synagogue HOME
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Can You Raise a Child Without God? ARTICLE ARCHIVE
Life-Cycle Ceremonies By Ken Burk My wife and I are raising our daughter, Shannon, in a Humanistic Jewish congregation in Holidays suburban Chicago, Kol Hadash. The path to Kol Hadash was not straightforward and we definitely had more than a bit of luck that helped us make this decision. Relationships Growing up, I was very fortunate that my parents were members of the Humanistic Spirituality Birmingham Temple in suburban Detroit. This was no small accomplishment. My father came Religious Journeys from a devout Lutheran upbringing. My mother was raised Unitarian. This was during the early 1970s and the religious landscape of questioning and exploration was certainly different than Talking About God in Interfaith it is today. While my parents were uncomfortable with an establishment dictating what to Families believe and didn't feel able to place their faith in an unsubstantial god, they relished participation in community. Interfaith Families and the Synagogue Fortuitously for them, they moved to a suburb of Detroit with a substantial Jewish Conversion presence. Down the block lived a family that introduced them to a community that Introduction to Judaism Programs didn't tell them what to believe and encouraged people to rely on the very Arts and Entertainment tangible strength of their own abilities as News and Opinion well as mankind. Several factors led my parents to convert to Judaism. The InterfaithFamily.com greatest factor was Sherwin Wine, rabbi of the Birmingham Temple, and his Friday InterfaithFamily.com Magazine Past night services. His frank, intellectual Issues By Year analysis of philosophy and history touched a chord in my parents. Another major CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA factor was the people they met, with whom they shared many common interests. I BLOGS cannot remember a time when my parents were not part of the temple's Vivace DISCUSSION BOARDS program, a musical concert series with no religious affiliation, and they are still very NEWS AND ADVOCACY involved to this day.
ABOUT IFF Despite my parent's active involvement in the temple community, I had little personal connection to Humanistic Judaism or to my contemporaries in the temple. For approximately a PRESS ROOM decade, I would say I had no connection to Humanistic Judaism. My own experience was definitely not engaging beyond my Bar Mitzvah year--in fact it wasn't particularly engaging STORE before that. I think this is an area where positive changes have been made because the education program which had consisted of a K-5 Sunday school has now expanded to K-12. In her own way, my wife grew up in a similarly convoluted "religious" household. Her mother Find stopped practicing Judaism before she married my father-in-law. My non-Jewish father-in-law can't stand organized religion and they raised my wife in a secular household in Park Ridge, powered by FreeFind Ill. Her extended family, however, still included a combination of Christian and Jewish cultures, although she had only limited exposure to both. When we married, our wedding ceremony included a rabbinical student recently ordained from the Birmingham Temple and my wife's uncle, an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ. Fortunately, both resided in Michigan and we were able to discuss the details of the
ceremony on trips from our home near Chicago. My wife wanted the ceremony to have a familial focus and I wanted one that would have Jewish customs with a secular bent. I was very glad that my wife supported having Rabbi Adam Chalom, the rabbinical student from the Birmingham Temple. During his tenure as an assistant rabbi before Rabbi Wine retired, I was fortunate to attend High Holidays services where he showcased his intellectual acumen and sardonic wit. We lived a DINK (dual-income, no kids) style for several years. Joining any congregation was way down on the list of things to do. I think my wife was a little more concerned with finding
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Featured some religious community because she wanted to explore the Unitarian Church. We just Partners/Funders/Links never really got around to it, which was more than fine with me. Then we had a string of good fortune. My wife became pregnant, and soon after that we discovered that a relatively new Humanistic congregation in suburban Chicago had hired Rabbi Chalom. I was very excited and my wife became a little more interested in learning the ins and outs of Humanistic Judaism. We attended many Friday night services, really enjoyed Login the discussions and decided to join. When we attended Rabbi Chalom's induction ceremony, we had one of our first opportunities Login Name: to talk with other members of the congregation at length. Rather than simply attending services and making polite conversation on a Friday night, we sat down and had dinner with Kol Hadash members. Although the night honored Rabbi Chalom, it was also a very special Password: night for us because so many people spent time welcoming us into the community and genuinely got to know us. After such a warm reception into our new community, we had the feeling that we would be members for a long time. Despite the draws of the temple community, my wife still had some personal issues. Her Not Signed Up? Find Out More. brother had converted to Catholicism several years ago. Many of our family events are driven by the Christian holiday calendar and my wife began to have a minor identity crisis. She enjoyed connections to Christian events, such as the baptisms of her nephews, Easter dinner at her brother's house, Christmas dinner at our house. Despite her own mother's Jewish upbringing, my attempts to celebrate Jewish calendar events before joining Kol Hadash were largely ignored. We had very little Jewish culture in our lives, and religious culture was something my wife yearned to have. Fortunately, as part of the initiatives the rabbi took as the new leader of the congregation, he planned an adult B'Nai Mitzvah class with a curriculum focusing on Jewish history. He had outlined the curriculum to us during a personal meeting as we discussed our new membership. This wonderful class not only offered a way for my wife to learn about her own Jewish heritage and culture that she had had little opportunity to explore previously, but also enabled her to bond with other temple members. It's not surprising that she ends up spending an extra hour after the class each week in a free form discussion with her classmates. One of the biggest challenges I foresee in raising our nearly 2-year-old daughter Shannon in a Humanistic temple is that Humanism doesn't have the mythology and simple answers that allow children to bond to it. It lacks the simple black and white, good and evil. Our tradition does not have mythical perfect heroes or the melodrama of fatalistic character flaws. The heroes of humanism--the pioneers, the challengers and the torch bearers, like Rabbi Wine (who founded the Secular Humanistic movement) or Richard Dawkins, the non-apologetic atheist, scientist and humanist--are real people with real flaws and fascinating stories. But it will be many years before Shannon has the attention span to follow this kind of story or be ready to embrace the greatness of a hero despite the fact that the hero is a real person with real flaws. In my own upbringing, I attended Sunday school and Hebrew school, but never really learned about the people of Humanistic Judaism or Humanism in general. We had Rabbi Wine, the imposing leader, walking the halls of the Sunday school, but no one celebrated the amazing struggles he went through to create Humanistic Judaism. As a child, I could shake hands with this man, but I didn't learn much of his history until I was in my late 20s! Raising Shannon in a Humanistic temple will involve more than just taking her to services and Sunday school. She will need to be challenged intellectually so that she gets a charge from Humanistic Judaism. I consider myself fortunate that I've had a second chance at it, not just as a belief system, but as a community, and I know that our daughter may not be so fortunate. Therefore I will have to be sure that she gets drawn into the community--preferably those members of the community who are near her own age and have similar interests--so that she has someplace comfortable and meaningful for her life-cycle events without needing to be as lucky as her parents.
Ken and his family live in Arlington Heights, Ill., a suburb of Chicago where he writes computer software. They are members of Kol Hadash Humanistic Congregation.
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Of Shalom and Om ARTICLE ARCHIVE By Heather Lazar Life-Cycle Ceremonies For me, appreciation of another culture is directly related to that particular culture's degree of Holidays inclusiveness. My experiences with other faiths and cultures have enhanced my own spirituality and mentality and encouraged me to share Judaism not only within Jewish circles Relationships but outside of them as well. When we open our traditions to those outside of our own ethnic Love and Marriage group, we offer them a window into our hearts and a sign of open-mindedness. This philosophy allows me to share Jewish holidays, in a secular way, with non-Jewish people. Raising Children in Interfaith Families Admiring aspects or principles of other faiths does not necessarily diminish one's Growing Up in an Interfaith Family own belief system. Two years ago, my then-fiancé (now husband), Rajen, gave Interdating me a necklace that has an om pendant. In Hinduism, om symbolizes creation, unity, Adoption and existence. Rajen believes this necklace protects me from harm. Wearing Extended Family Relationships this necklace, however, does not make me Hindu, yet I can still appreciate some of the Telling Parents About Religious Decisions for Your Children faith's universal beauty and applications. Similarly, it is possible to admire another Grandparenting culture or faith without being a member of that culture or faith. Four years ago, I Divorce and Step-Family Issues The om symbol worked as an English teacher in Japan. As Travel a foreigner, I was highly interested in Japanese celebrations and customs. I was honored whenever my Japanese friends would Multi-racial and Multi-cultural share their ceremonies and traditions with me. While I could never be Japanese, this fact Families never lessoned my appreciation or admiration of Japanese festivals. Jewish-Muslim Relationships Now that I am in an interfaith relationship, I want to share my culture and ethnicity just as others have shared their cultural traditions with me. After all, the prefix "inter" signifies an Gay Interfaith Relationships entity that is "between, among, shared by or derived from two." Since we are two unique halves joined in partnership, we should take great pride in both of our heritages. Spirituality Just as I did not have to change my belief system or be a member of another faith or culture Arts and Entertainment to appreciate that faith and culture, neither does my fiancé. Although he is not Jewish, he can News and Opinion certainly participate in Jewish holidays and traditions without diminishing his own sense of identity or ethnic association. InterfaithFamily.com Celebrating Jewish holidays in a secular way helps my fiancé InterfaithFamily.com Magazine Past to be not just an observer but also a participant during the Issues By Year celebration. To encourage inclusiveness of other faiths and ethnicities, I like to translate what each Jewish holiday means CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA into a universal principle. For example, Jewish people fast on the High Holiday of Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of BLOGS Atonement. Fasting is a type of awakening and a sign of compassion for those experiencing hunger. If my fiancé and I DISCUSSION BOARDS choose to fast, we are not only remembering Jewish suffering but the suffering of all who do not have enough to eat. NEWS AND ADVOCACY On my favorite holiday, Passover, we remember the Jewish ABOUT IFF people's Exodus from Egypt. On this day, we try to relive the Exodus in a spiritual sense. Each Jew should imagine what PRESS ROOM slavery and the escape from slavery was like. This is a beautiful holiday that teaches us to savor the sweetness of freedom without forgetting the bitterness of bondage. STORE To include my fiancé in this holiday, I make my own hagaddah, or prayer book. Instead of only writing about the Jewish people's experience, I apply the lessons of Passover Find to people all over the world. We can imagine all people who powered by FreeFind
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were or are slaves and the promise of freedom for all human beings.
While my family worried that marrying a non-Jew would take away from my Jewish identity, I actually think my relationship enhances it. By applying Jewish traditions and practices to universal principles, I am extending my faith and ethnicity to
all people, not just sharing it amongst one group. Just as I am giving and sharing my culture, I feel more receptive to learning about and absorbing aspects of other cultures and faiths.
In my heart, I am and will always be a Jew, but in my spirit, I learn from every faith, tradition, and culture. So, on the Featured wonderful holiday of Hanukkah, for example, we will eat Partners/Funders/Links latkes and kugel, play with dreidels and sing Hanukkah songs, just as many other Jewish families do. The only difference is that when we light the candles, we may end our Hebrew prayer with "om om om" in celebration of all people in each and every part of our world.
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Login Name: Heather Lazar currently lives in the Uptown neighborhood of Chicago, Ill., and works as an associate editor for an educational publisher. In April 2007, she and her soul mate, Rajen, were Password: married.
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Interfaith Families and Secular Judaism ARTICLE ARCHIVE
Life-Cycle Ceremonies By Cantor and Rabbi Judith Seid "It works for us because it allows for both," says Caren, the daughter of a Methodist minister, Holidays who is married to Mark, born and raised a Conservative Jew (their names are changed to protect their privacy). Their two kids have no question that they're Jewish; both attended the Relationships Secular Jewish Sunday School and celebrate Jewish holidays at home and with the Secular Spirituality Jewish community in their Midwest college town.
Religious Journeys Caren was comfortable raising her kids as Jews--as long as they didn't learn to consider their mother the "other" and themselves "chosen." In a Secular Humanist Jewish community, we Talking About God in Interfaith don't talk about Jews as the "chosen people" because we don't believe that there is anyone to Families do the choosing. We believe every ethnicity has its own strengths and beauties. Kids of dual- culture families are welcomed. In fact, "Secular Jewishness does not merely accept inter- Interfaith Families and the cultural families; it celebrates the additional richness that they bring to our communities. Synagogue Secular Jewishness does not demand that the non-Jewish partner relinquish her/his heritage; we stress the importance to the child(ren) that the heritages of both parents be accorded Conversion equal importance and respect in the family," says Hershl Hartman, vegveyser (leader) of Sholem Community, an affiliate of the Congress of Secular Jewish Organizations, in Los Introduction to Judaism Programs Angeles. Arts and Entertainment We especially encourage acknowledging both heritages of a child of interfaith parents at our News and Opinion Bar or Bat Mitzvah observances. Because our ceremonies are about Jewish culture, heritage and history, they consist of the students presenting projects they have chosen, rather than InterfaithFamily.com leading services and reading from the classical Jewish texts. This allows for the equal participation of both parents and leads to some wonderfully creative presentations that InterfaithFamily.com Magazine Past celebrate both sides of the student's heritage while allowing him or herself to take his or her Issues By Year place in the Jewish world. For example, the son of a Danish mother and Jewish father presented a paper on how the Danes saved the Jews during World War II; the child of a CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA Mexican father and Jewish mother delved into the Jews of Mexico. At the Bar/Bat Mitzvahs, we sing "Siman Tov u'Mazal Tov" and sometimes we sing it again in the language of the BLOGS child's other heritage.
DISCUSSION BOARDS This celebration of dual heritage begins long before the Bar Mitzvah, however, with the baby- naming ceremony. In religious Jewish communities, boys have a circumcision ceremony and NEWS AND ADVOCACY girls are named with much less fuss in the synagogue. In a Secular Jewish naming--the same ceremony for a boy and a girl--the parents explain why they gave the child its names--both ABOUT IFF Jewish and general. We often give everyone in attendance the opportunity to give the child a blessing or good wishes, and I often end the ceremony with, "Each of us, parents, friends and PRESS ROOM family, have our particular responsibilities for this child. We hope for the wisdom to help guide him/her to reach his/her own fullest potential, to develop his/her own talents and to come to an STORE understanding of his/her own place in the world and in the Jewish community while honoring the heritages of both her/his parents." Because we include the entire family, a Secular Jewish naming ceremony can also serve in place of a christening or baptism, satisfying both heritages in a single unified ceremony. Find The parents of the babies named in Secular Jewish ceremonies are often those who were powered by FreeFind married by Secular or Humanistic Jewish leaders and rabbis, sometimes in concert with an officiant of a different faith. It's important to those of us who perform weddings to make sure that the wedding is not half-and-half, but rather expresses what the couple has in common. We include elements of both heritages, but the words said apply to both members of the couple. When I co-officiate, I like to share elements with my co-officiants. I will hold the rings while they are blessed by a minister. A Hindu pundit will hold the wine while I say a benediction. We model a way for an interfaith family to enjoy and participate in each others' ceremonies while maintaining their own ethnic and religious identities. One wedding between a Christian minister and a Cultural Jew presented a particular difficulty. The groom insisted he needed a blessing, while the bride refused to have any religious language used. For over an hour, my Episcopalian co-officiant and I coached the couple through coming to language that would work for both. We finally settled on a formula of "May you always..." which the groom understood as meaning "May God allow you to..." and the bride understood as a secular benediction. Whether Secular Jewish officiants work with clergy
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Featured of other religions or officiate alone at an interfaith wedding, we make every effort to honor both Partners/Funders/Links cultures to the extent that the couple feels comfortable. Weddings, Bar/Bat Mitzvahs and baby-namings allow us time to work out the intricacies of cross-cultural communication. Funerals are another matter. The prayers that honor the dead are not those that comfort the living. Those who call us to officiate have to trust us to represent both heritages while making everyone feel included. We don't pretend that there Login was only one religion in the household, and we include elements of the mourning rites of both. Sometimes, the ceremonies are a lot alike--both Buddhists and Jews bathe the body after death--but more often the customs differ. Jews do not usually have a wake or viewing as is Login Name: common in some Christian traditions, but we are open to the family wishing to view their loved one before interment or cremation. Christians tend to send flowers to a funeral; it is more common for Jews to give charity in memory of the deceased. Interfaith families often offer Password: both opportunities, and can even combine them by donating the flowers to a nursing home. Secular Jewish officiants do not use any God-language in our ceremonies, but we can acknowledge the religious faith of the deceased and of the survivors and the place this faith has in their lives. Some of us will ask another person to offer a prayer the family wants; others Not Signed Up? Find Out More. prefer to concentrate only on the life of the deceased. Either way, our funeral services are about the person, the family and the community, not about any gods. They include poetry and other readings expressing the sadness we feel on parting with a loved one, joy in the life he or she shared with us, and our sense of finality. Often, we offer several choices to the family and they chose the readings that have meaning to them. We usually sing "Ha'yamim kholfim"--the Hebrew words mean, "the days pass, the years go by, but the love and the friendship remain forever." Because of this, a Secular Jewish funeral is emotionally satisfying to all, with the family feeling their loved one was truly represented. The basis of all Secular Jewish life-cycle ceremonies is to concentrate on the person involved. We respect each person for who he is, and we celebrate the capacity of people to love others regardless of background or belief. The website for the Congress of Secular Jewish Organizations, with affiliates in the US and Canada, is csjo.org. Ideas for Secular Holiday and life cycle celebrations can be found on the Center for Cultural Judaism's website.
Cantor and Rabbi Judith Seid is a graduate of the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism and holds a master's degree in Jewish Communal Studies from Hebrew Union College. She is the parent of three fourth-generation secularists and the wife of a born Christian who is now a Secular Jew. Judith Seid serves on the executive committee of the Congress of Secular Jewish Organizations. Her most recent book is God-Optional Judaism: Alternatives for Cultural Jews Who Love Their History, Heritage, and Community.
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Home > Article Archive > Holidays > Passover and Easter HOME
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Our Secular Humanistic Seder ARTICLE ARCHIVE By Deborah Freeman Life-Cycle Ceremonies My family and I have attended a secular humanistic seder for many years at the home of our Holidays rabbi. This year a special treat was the first appearance of 3-year-old twins, children of long- time congregation friends. They were too young to read the Four Questions, but I'm sure Shabbat they'll be able to soon. Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur As we were coming home this year, my 21- year-old daughter said, "Guess what I The December Holidays thought was the best part of the service?" I Passover and Easter thought she was going to say that this was the first year she could drink wine, instead Other Holidays of grape juice. In fact, she said she liked a line from Rabbi Schweitzer's The Liberated Relationships Haggadah, which includes a modern humanistic version of Dayenu: "If the seder Spirituality was just an excuse once a year to see distant relatives, some of whom you Arts and Entertainment actually like, Dayenu (it would have been News and Opinion enough)." I had noticed my daughter sitting at the far end of the table, where she InterfaithFamily.com always sits, with the girls she has known since they prepared together for their Bat Mitzvah ceremonies, and I realized they had been trading stories about annoying relatives. InterfaithFamily.com Magazine Past Issues By Year My husband, who is Catholic of Italian descent, said that the part of the service that gets to him every year is the idea of the fifth child: CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA "Some say there's also a fifth child who no longer sits at the table. This child BLOGS has fallen away by attrition and disaffection. This child has been turned away by rejection and disapproval. She is feeling sad and lonely. He is feeling angry DISCUSSION BOARDS and bitter. There's always a seat at this table. Please come back to us. We cherish you forever." NEWS AND ADVOCACY
ABOUT IFF My husband doesn't know the tradition that there are only four children. He only knows that the humanistic story of the fifth child, who may be isolated but is never forgotten, speaks to PRESS ROOM him about the spiritual journey we are all on, looking for a welcoming home where we will be accepted without condition. STORE For many traditionally oriented Jews, I think these lines from our service would be irreverent at best and disrespectful at worst. But I believe that by changing and adapting language to fit our own modern convictions and sensibilities, humanism reaches me and my family in a way no other expression of Judaism could. A traditional service would be, to us, something Find incomprehensible to endure silently and politely, as nobody in my family speaks or powered by FreeFind understands Hebrew. Even beyond the language barrier, the fact that our service is modern and innovative gives us all permission to express, in our own words, our own creativity in the matter of our relationship to the essential and the moral, and to bring to our religious life the qualities we bring to other important aspects of our lives, specifically our desire to define and re-define ourselves concerning our place on this earth.
The standard Passover service explains how to relate the same story in different ways in order to reach different kinds of children. Our humanistic congregation enlarges that concept to reach out to the different kinds of people within a single family. Like so many American families, we are all quite different in our make-up: I am a first generation Ashkenazi Jew who wants to retain a non-theistic connection to my cultural heritage and childhood; my husband, while non-observant, has cultural and family ties to Catholicism; and my daughter is a product of both her parents, besides being her own very special person with her own opinions and views. Going on a secular humanistic path, we can all enjoy attending the seder together every year for the opportunity to revisit communally the traditional stories and rituals, and to find individually meaning in our own special favorite parts. Featured
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Partners/Funders/Links My family and I shape our lives independent of supernatural authority, and this reality is a source of neither pride nor shame. I read once that, if diagnosed with a disease you never heard of, those who believe in God would go straight to synagogue to pray for strength, while those who don't would go straight to their computer to Google the new disease and find out as
much as possible about options and prognosis. The fact that I'm inclined towards the computer model doesn't mean that I'm not proud of my Jewish cultural heritage that I turn to at Login holidays, life-cycle events, and special moments in my life.
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Deborah Freeman is on the board of directors of The City Password: Congregation for Humanistic Judaism. She lives in Brooklyn, N.Y., with her husband and daughter.
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE "Mazel Tov" Instead of "Oy Vey" ARTICLE ARCHIVE
Life-Cycle Ceremonies Interview by Ronnie Friedland Web Magazine Editor Ronnie Friedland interviews Holidays Rabbi Adam Chalom of Kol Hadash , a Humanistic Relationships congregation in suburban Chicago.
Spirituality Rabbi Chalom talks about his congregation's very welcoming attitude towards interfaith families and Religious Journeys his non-judgmental stance on interfaith weddings.
Talking About God in Interfaith To hear an mp3 of the interview, click here. Families
Interfaith Families and the Synagogue Ronnie Friedland is editor of Conversion InterfaithFamily.com's Web Magazine. Introduction to Judaism Programs
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Judaism, Please. Hold the Deity.
ARTICLE ARCHIVE By Jesse Tisch Review of God-Optional Judaism: Alternatives for Cultural Jews Who Love Their History, Life-Cycle Ceremonies Heritage, and Community by Judith Seid (Citadel Press, 2001). Holidays In a mainstream Jewish synagogue, God is like the pews--pretty much indispensable. Yet given the number of secular and agnostic Jews in America, it's worth pondering the question: Relationships Can you take the theism out of Judaism? Spirituality That's the idea behind God-Optional Judaism, by Judith Seid. Seid is a lively writer and, it's Arts and Entertainment clear from her first 10 pages, a total mensch. She's politely irreverent. Her book isn't for everyone. Some will find it an act of profound chutzpah. On the other hand, you'd have to be a Books curmudgeon not to like a book that mixes recipes for hamantashen with tips for decorating your backyard sukkah. Films, Theater, TV and Music God-Optional Judaism is a warm, engaging introduction to the Interviews and Profiles most liberal stream of Judaism: Secular Humanistic Judaism. Like most Secular Humanists, Seid takes disbelief seriously. News and Opinion Secular Humanists recoil from "lavish devotion" to God. "Some of us are just constitutionally unable to say what we don't InterfaithFamily.com believe," Seid explains. Instead, they focus on family, social justice, and Jewish peoplehood. They're on the side of the InterfaithFamily.com Magazine Past angels, without believing in them. Issues By Year If that sounds new, it isn't. Seid is part of a long tradition of CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA non-traditional Judaism. In the 20th century, Jews have been Jewish through politics, Yiddish culture, and the idea that BLOGS humans, not a deity, have a say in the way the universe is run. As it happens, Seid is not so much anti-tradition as against the DISCUSSION BOARDS very idea of tradition. "Who are the real Jews?" she asks at one point--her answer being that we all are, since there are NEWS AND ADVOCACY multiple ways of being Jewish, all equally valid. Once that's out of the way, we're free to create our own Judaism, based on our ABOUT IFF own beliefs, principles, and pantry ingredients. (Seriously: for the recipes alone, this book is worth the jacket price.) PRESS ROOM To that end, Seid's book is crammed with advice for crafting your own self-tailored Judaism. STORE Seid is pro-experimentation: She defends your right to cherry-pick from various traditions, including Eastern religions. (If you want to dabble in mysticism, Seid won't judge--though she thinks "Jewish Buddhist" is somewhat oxymoronic.) As for Jewish rituals, Seid lists plenty of possibilities beyond mainstream Judaism, from a secular shabbos (Sabbath) to marriage Find ceremonies to saying Kaddish (prayer said by mourners). If you're curious about God-optional funerals, Seid has you covered. powered by FreeFind If all that makes the book sound chirpy, it occasionally is. But Seid is serious. And her book's message--that no one should have a monopoly on Judaism--is a serious one. Seid makes an elegant case for pluralism, based on the idea that Judaism has always tolerated (if not always embraced) multiple traditions. A quick walk through history proves her point: From the 8th century Karaites ("strongly anti-clerical") to various mystical movements in the Middle Ages, to the 19th century Haskalah, or "Jewish Enlightenment," Seid compiles a nice list of challenges to rabbinical authority. Seid's own challenge is mostly polite, though occasionally pointed: Seid thinks the notion of "real Judaism" has been foisted on American Jews by the Orthodox, who claim that mantle for
themselves. Agree or disagree, the idea of "authenticity" is worth engaging. In America, it informs every discussion about Israel ("real" Jews support Israel), synagogue membership ("real" Jews go to shul), and intermarriage ("real" Jews refrain). The cult of authenticity has profoundly shaped American Judaism, Seid points out. On one hand, it explains why so many agnostic Jews join religious synagogues: they want the "real" Judaism of their ancestors (even if their ancestors were atheists). On the other hand, it leads many American Jews to Featured reject Judaism altogether, since they find "real" Judaism, with its manifold laws and Partners/Funders/Links proscriptions, incompatible with modern life. The way out of this tangle, Seid realizes, is to broaden the definition of what's authentically
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Jewish. Seid truly gets it. What she doesn't do is lecture, kvetch, or admonish. God-Optional Judaism will find a sympathetic audience with Jews who judge Judaism too rigid and theistic, too patriarchal or paternalistic. It will appeal to the progressive side of religious Jews, and to the spiritual side of progressive Jews. And for those who find the whole idea of God-optional Login Judaism wrong and offensive, there are some great Jewish recipes to fall back on.
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Jesse Tisch is a freelance writer and the assistant editor of Password: Contemplate: the International Journal of Cultural Jewish Thought.
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Avoiding Jewish "Nothingness"
ARTICLE ARCHIVE By Michael Felsen Review of Secular Jewishness for Our Time, edited by Barnett Zumoff and Karl D. Zuckerman Life-Cycle Ceremonies (The Forward Association). Holidays Can a person really be secular and Jewish at the same time? If so, what makes him or her "Jewish"? Does it matter? Why? These are the among the questions posed and answered, Relationships sometimes comprehensively, sometimes anecdotally, sometimes dogmatically, by three Spirituality generations of writers, educators, and cultural activists in Secular Jewishness for Our Time.
Arts and Entertainment This volume presents itself as a three-part "symposium," comprising articles that appeared in Books Kultur un Dertsiung (Culture and Education), the Yiddish monthly journal of the Workmen's Circle, a Films, Theater, TV and Music 100-year-old secular, progressive Jewish communal organization, during 1938-39 and 1968-69, followed Interviews and Profiles by invited papers written from 1998-2000. Each series of essays, penned mostly by Workmen's News and Opinion Circle educators, professionals, and lay activists, is centered around the same overarching question-- InterfaithFamily.com "how one can be Jewish and yet not 'religious'?"-- InterfaithFamily.com Magazine Past and each is framed by its different historical context Issues By Year over a 60-year period.
CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA As such, the essays present a bit of a time capsule: reading the earliest set, one can almost palpably BLOGS sense the hustle and bustle of blue collar union activists and revolutionary idealists on the DISCUSSION BOARDS pushcarted streets of the New York shtetl that was the Lower East Side. Yiddish, knishes, and payes NEWS AND ADVOCACY (sidecurls worn by some Orthodox men) were everywhere; even the most radical atheist socialist ABOUT IFF was surrounded by and enmeshed in Jewishness, in those years on the cusp of the Holocaust. Not so in PRESS ROOM the late '60s; the essays reflect the movement of Jews, religious and non-religious, to the suburbs, away from their street corner society; STORE consequently, they reflect a people drifting toward assimilation in the Levittowns and Scarsdales of America, while searching for ways to hold on to a Jewish identity. Finally, the most contemporary of the articles more or less mirror the deliberations of activist, 21st century secular Jews today: Jews who are becoming more and more comfortable building and promoting a vibrant and viable alternative to religiously-based Jewishness. Find powered by FreeFind Secular Jewishness began in earnest more than 200 years ago, with the Haskalah, a European movement intended to bring the Enlightenment, with its embrace of this-worldliness, rationalism and humanism to the Jewish people, as a counterpoint to the perceived exclusivity, coerciveness, and superstition associated with religious dogma and practice. But the Haskalah did not seek to destroy Jewishness; rather, it hoped to redefine its contours by infusing modern, secular culture and thinking into a society previously dominated by traditional
religious ideology. This book is addressed to the progeny of the Haskalah movement: those Jews of today who are uncomfortable with the worship of a personal, omnipotent God--and the religious trappings that accompany that belief system--but abhor, as the editors put it, "Jewish nothingness." Its intended audience is those of us who proudly affirm our Jewishness principally through secular culture, broadly defined, in its many and varied manifestations. That culture, peopled by such literary lights as Sholem Aleichem and I.L. Peretz, and countless thinkers, composers, playwrights, and social activists, is a very rich one indeed. The essays in large measure offer each writer's vision of the elements of a sustainable Jewish life that doesn't depend on religion as its lifeblood. The early essays tend to focus on the centrality of Yiddish (the 1,000-year old language of the Eastern European shtetl, spoken by Featured 70 to 80 percent of world Jewry at the beginning of the 20th Century), on progressive, socialist Partners/Funders/Links politics, and on simply living "Jewishly" in the home. As author and teacher Abraham Golomb put it: "Jewish noodle-pudding and tsholent contain more Jewishness than seventy-seven philosophical systems of Jewishness…" Another key theme, for each generation of essays, is
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holidays: which to observe; how to render them meaningful and beautiful; which traditional observances to keep and which to replace. This theme reverberates throughout the book, reflecting a common quest for new and emotionally satisfying expressions of Jewishness that, as author and poet Joseph Mlotek tells us in 1968, are "free of dogma… but are nonetheless Login rooted in the history of our people." It's reflected in Yiddish philologist Yudl Mark's observation that Yom Kippur may indeed be observed by a secular Jew, since "he, as an individual, can Login Name: be enlightened by a twenty-four hour dialogue with his soul." Additionally, several of the essays explore whether secular Jewishness, like its religious relative, requires its own, newly crafted "table of laws" for the non-religious. Password: Where does all this leave the secular Jew of today? Still searching, certainly. But also, perhaps, finding. In the most recent crop of essays, Motl Zelmanowicz notes that of the current six million Jews in this country, a million no longer acknowledge their Jewishness, and another two million do identify with the Jewish people but aren't affiliated with any synagogue Not Signed Up? Find Out More. or other Jewish organization. Many of these, no doubt, are secular Jews who would value a Jewish community "home" if they could find one. Do such places of secular Jewish belonging exist in the contemporary American landscape? (Several of the authors note that secular Jews, bound together by their national identity and not by their religious belief, comprise a substantial percentage of the Israeli population.) William Stern's essay acknowledges Rabbi Sherwin Wine's pioneering contribution to this cause, through his establishment in 1963 of the non-God-centered Birmingham Temple in suburban Detroit, Mich. Since then, the Society for Humanistic Judaism that he helped establish has spawned non-theistic congregations in a number of communities throughout the United States, as well as the International Federation of Secular Humanistic Jews, a worldwide association of like-minded national organizations. Ellen Bates-Brackett, Detroit field director for the Workmen's Circle, also offers such a home, as she writes convincingly about how involvement in secular Jewish community life can satisfy an impressive list of fundamental human needs: finding one's identity, having a sense of belonging, transmitting culture and values to progeny, having purpose, order, and ethical guides in life, dealing with personal and global adversity, expressing a sense of wonder and gratitude, and finding spiritual meaning. At Boston Workmen's Circle, for example (of which this writer is a member), we recognize the human needs that Bates-Brackett articulates, strive to address them, and, hopefully, in many respects, succeed. Our community offers shule (secular Sunday School) for the children, including a festive annual graduation-Bar/Bat Mitzvah ceremony; an 80-member Yiddish Community Chorus that performs in such venues as the National Yiddish Book Center, multi- cultural festivals, nursing homes, and Yom Hashoah and Warsaw Ghetto Uprising commemorative events; Yiddish and adult education classes; non-religious, but deeply moving, holiday celebrations (our Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur observances, for example, draw upwards of 450 participants); social action involvement, including Middle East peace work, labor and immigrants' rights support (including an annual children's protest against sweatshops), and Muslim-Jewish interfaith dialogue, among other projects. Each year, as our community broadens and deepens, we find ourselves addressing our needs, and expressing our progressive, secular Jewishness, in new and exciting ways. As this collection demonstrates, secular Jews have been exploring what it means to be Jewish, and also non-religious, for several generations. And the path going forward is clear: we will continue to question and to find new answers, all the while cherishing, and nurturing, our sometimes tangled but always deep Jewish roots.
Michael Felsen has lived in Jamaica Plain, Mass., with his family for the past 29 years. He is a senior attorney with the U.S. Department of Labor, where he's worked for 28 years enforcing federal worker protection laws. He's also quite active with the Boston Workmen's Circle. Currently, as vice-president, he works on several committees, and he has sung bass with their Yiddish chorus, "A Besere Velt" ("A Better World"), since its inception almost 10 years ago.
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Is the Popularity of Jewish Culture Sustainable?
ARTICLE ARCHIVE By Chanan Tigay NEW YORK, April 26, 2006 (JTA)--Heeb. Matisyahu. Guilt & Pleasure. Times are flush if Life-Cycle Ceremonies you're a young, culturally minded Jew. Holidays Indeed, the last few years have seen an explosion in artistic and cultural activity by and for Jews. Matisyahu, a Chasidic reggae singer, for example, has sold more than 500,000 albums. Relationships And Heeb, a Jewish magazine aimed at young hip Jews, has been the subject of much Spirituality chatter and numerous articles in the mainstream media.
Arts and Entertainment "There's a mammoth market for this," said Roger Bennett, publisher of Guilt & Pleasure, which defines Books itself as "a magazine for Jews and the people who love them" and which sold out its first issue in Films, Theater, TV and Music November 2005.
Interviews and Profiles With intermarriage rampant, synagogue membership among young Jews on the decline and News and Opinion a general sense that younger Jews are less connected to Judaism, Jewish communal leaders InterfaithFamily.com are on the lookout for ways to get the younger generation to connect and to engage in a InterfaithFamily.com Magazine Past conversation about Jewish identity, community and Issues By Year meaning. CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA Some of these young people, and, increasingly, some of their elders, say that the way to their hearts- BLOGS -and minds and pocketbooks--is through artistic and cultural exchange: Jewish music, books, movies and DISCUSSION BOARDS art. NEWS AND ADVOCACY But along with the explosion of Jewish arts come many questions. At its 2006 conference in Denver, the Jewish Funders Network offered ABOUT IFF several panels and discussions on the place of arts and culture in today's Jewish milieu. At the conference and beyond, Jewish thinkers are asking whether the arts should be viewed as PRESS ROOM a gateway to further Jewish involvement or are valuable as a destination in and of themselves. STORE The debate may be meaningless to a group of Jews dancing at a Matisyahu concert but it has practical applications in terms of funding for Jewish culture. Artistic endeavors cost money, and the people with the money tend not to be the same young people attracted to reggae music, even if it is being sung by a guy in a long beard and black hat. Find powered by FreeFind "There is no easy way to quantify the value of art," Connie Wolf, director of the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco, said during one such panel at the gathering of Jewish foundations. "When it comes to art, there are always more questions than answers." But others, while acknowledging culture's appeal, wonder whether such pursuits are likely to produce committed Jews or are apt to fizzle out.
"I think everything that we've learned in the last hundred years teaches us that the bonds of religion are actually much stronger than the bonds of culture," Jonathan Sarna, a professor at Brandeis University and a leading commentator on American Jewish history, said in an interview.
Still, Sarna believes that just as venture capital firms fund numerous startups knowing that only a few will succeed, some Jewish cultural initiatives--those that appear to be successful and cost-effective--ought to be funded by the Jewish community.
It is clear these cultural endeavors are popular. Ari Kelman, a research fellow at Featured Hebrew Union College, has done two Partners/Funders/Links studies of contemporary Jewish culture in New York along with sociologist Steven M.
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Cohen. He discussed the findings at the funders conference.
"The numbers exceed anybody's Login expectations," he said "People are dying for it." Login Name: Young Jews, the studies found, are less and less interested in taking part in activities that are strictly Jewish. And while Password: taking part in a Jewish cultural activity may not spur many to join a synagogue or give to their local federation, they may go to another cultural event.
Not Signed Up? Find Out More. "It gets them to do other Jewish stuff in this sphere," said Kelman, author of the forthcoming book, Station Identification: A Cultural History of Yiddish Radio. "If they go to a concert, they'll go to another concert--including people who have never been to one before." Funders young and old are grappling with this new phenomenon. "The generation that is older has to understand that engagement that looks different than the way they engaged is still engagement," said Danielle Durchslag, 25, of New York, a board member of the Nathan Cummings Foundation and a founding member of Grand Street, a network of twentysomethings who are involved in their family philanthropies. As Jewish artistic expressions proliferate, many of these older funders--from wealthy individuals to family foundations to Jewish federations--are beginning to come around to the idea. "It seems to me that our elders are at a point where they're beginning to listen to the message," Durchslag said, on the sidelines of the funders conference. But Bennett, also senior vice president at the Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies, acknowledged the difficulties inherent in this new approach. "For this to work," he said, more established donors "have to essentially support projects for which they are not the desired end users. It's a very hard emotional thing for a funder." Richard Siegel, executive director of the National Foundation for Jewish Culture, said that convincing people to allocate their dollars to the arts has not been easy. "There's tremendous resistance, as a general statement, to funding this sort of culture in Jewish life," he said. "But I'd say that there is also significant resistance for the support of culture in the broader American society. I don't necessarily think that we're a unique community in that regard." "There's a sense that culture is entertainment and if it's entertainment, then those who are entertained should pay for it," Siegel added. "But culture is far more than entertainment. It's about education. It's a means of values transmission. It's a means of looking into the nature of the community in a new and open way." Alisa Rubin Kurshan, vice president for strategic planning and organizational resources at UJA-Federation of New York, said her group has been funding cultural projects for years. She cites as examples an annual Jewish cultural festival in New York and a Jewish record label. "We are, in fact, funding these culturally rich Jewish experiences because we understand that they lead to higher forms of Jewish engagement," she said. "We also have other strategies that try to reach the affiliated Jews that help them become more engaged and connected to Jewish life." For Sarna, the long-term implications of approaching Jewish culture as a destination rather than a gateway to involvement are troubling. "If it remains a destination, then I fear that we may find that many of these Jews deeply committed to secular, cultural Judaism may discover that their children and grandchildren are happy to view that culture as part of their ancestral background but will not see the same need to pass it on to their generational offspring," he said. But for Jeffrey Solomon, president of the Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies, all this represents an enormous opportunity. "Gen. X and Gen. Y are extraordinarily self-confident; we have to present a self-confident Judaism," he said. "As we begin to measure connection between these portals and connection to Jewish life, donors will start to say, 'I get it.' "
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Chanan Tigay is a longtime journalist for publications ranging from Agence France-Presse to The Jerusalem Report to JTA. He received an MFA in creative writing from Columbia University, has recently completed a collection of short stories and is at work on a novel. He starred in the feature film Hitler's Strawberries by Academy Award- nominated director Gian-Luigi Polidoro and in the Off Broadway hit Grandma Sylvia's Funeral. He lives in Los Angeles and is at work on a television pilot. Apparently, he's not the only one in L.A. trying to break into T.V.
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Rabbi Field Embraces "Jews on the Edge"
ARTICLE ARCHIVE By Andrea Jacobs Reprinted with permission from the Intermountain Jewish News. Life-Cycle Ceremonies March 30, 2007 Holidays Passionate is an apt description of Rabbi Brian Field, the vocally expressive director of Relationships Judaism Your Way, a Denver-based outreach organization targeting interfaith families and the unaffiliated since October 2004. Spirituality Whether Jews approve of, tolerate or condemn intermarriage, it is an undeniable reality of the Arts and Entertainment 21st century. The subject can be touchy at best, painful at worst. News and Opinion "Some interfaith families we see have been told 'no' when they inquire about a lifecycle event at a The Outreach Debate synagogue," says Rabbi Field, who was ordained by Demographics the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in 1994.
Outreach Success Stories "Others have received an ambiguous or ambivalent message from parts of the Jewish community: 'On Rabbinic Officiation at the one hand, we want you, you're new blood; but Intermarriages on the other hand, we kind of wish that your non- Jewish spouse was Jewish--that you had made a Intermarriage and the Reform different choice.'" Movement This attitude, which Rabbi Field summarizes as Intermarriage and the Conservative "welcome but," might be unintentionally Movement communicated. Newsmakers Nevertheless, people hear it loud and clear.
Israel and Interfaith Families "People are sensitive," he says. "They pick up on the cues." Anti-Semitism and Interfaith Families Judaism Your Way is attempting to "articulate a way of offering a Judaism that provides an unambiguous The Holocaust and Interfaith welcome and affirmation to Jews and their loved Families ones, whoever they are and whatever they are," he says. September 11 The mosaic of opportunities at Judaism Your Way--which has about 1,000 households on its Teaching About Other Religions mailing list but is not a membership-based institution--includes wedding ceremonies between Jews and non-Jews, baby namings, Bar and Bat Mitzvahs or "alternative coming of age The Threat of Messianic Judaism celebrations," Shabbat services held in usual settings, regular holiday observances, and High InterfaithFamily.com Holiday services set in Hudson Gardens.
InterfaithFamily.com Magazine Past Judaism Your Way's Passover seder, scheduled for Monday, April 9, 6 p.m., at Four Mile Issues By Year Historic Park, will "be very high energy," enthuses Rabbi Field, "with lots of conversation, dance, song and laughter." CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA He chose the last day of Passover for the seder "as a significant alternative. This is when our BLOGS people actually crossed the sea." Judaism Your Way functions as an entryway toward Jewish practice, learning and community- DISCUSSION BOARDS -if that's what participants desire. NEWS AND ADVOCACY "One of the things we like to say is that wherever you are along your Jewish journey, we'll meet you there and help you figure out the next step," Rabbi Field says. ABOUT IFF It's an accommodating philosophy that sounds eerily similar to the approach used by Chabad. PRESS ROOM But Rabbi Field stresses that unlike Chabad or other Jewish outreach groups, Judaism Your Way does not have a Jewish agenda that pulls participants toward more traditional forms of STORE Judaism. "We have a mutually referring relationship with other synagogues and organizations," he says.
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Find "Congregations refer people to us if the programming members want is unavailable. Similarly, if someone in our group is looking for a deeper sense of community, I refer them to different powered by FreeFind synagogues, rabbis and Jewish organizations. I'm happy to do that. "But we're also aware that there's a lot more that needs to be done Jewishly to engage all the folks out there. Is there another way of teaching Judaism, studying Torah, praying, and celebrating the holidays and Shabbat that can engage those people whose needs are not being met in existing models?"
Yes, he answers with a wordless nod--Judaism Your Way. Rabbi Field is aware of various criticisms leveled against Judaism Your Way, especially the fact that he performs interfaith marriages without requiring that the non-Jewish partner convert. While some area rabbis marry interfaith couples, the practice deviates from the Rocky Mountain Rabbinical Council's longstanding policy.
Rabbi Field, who belongs to the RMRC, requests that all Jewish and non-Jewish partners Featured undergo "substantial" premarital counseling prior to marriage. Partners/Funders/Links "Conversion is a very powerful option," he emphasizes. "Several people are studying for conversion with me right now. "But I believe conversion is a deep matter of the soul. "For some, it will be a natural part of preparing to marry a Jew. For others, it might not happen for 20 years, if at all. Login "Conversion isn't for everyone. Login Name: "However, full participation in and contributions to Judaism are not precluded by a person's non-conversion," he adds.
Password: "People say to us, you're like a parent who can't say no to your child. "At Judaism Your Way, we answer that we want to embody a Judaism that finds a Jewish way to say 'yes' to as many Jews--and their loved ones--as possible."
Not Signed Up? Find Out More. Rabbi Field extends an open palm across the table. "When Judaism Your Way looks at the world, we try to see it the way Jacob did," he says, referring to Jacobs' blessing of Joseph's two sons. "When we see interfaith couples and non-Jewish participants in a Jewish setting, we don't see assimilation, dilution or depletion. "We see blessing." Rabbi Field, 49, has an affinity for helping Jews who stand at the spiritual edges of Judaism-- "those with one foot out of the water and one foot in." He was born in a suburb of Vancouver, British Columbia. His parents, who did not belong to a synagogue, sent him to the Peretz school, where Brian received an atypical Jewish education. "I learned Yiddish but not Hebrew," he says, "a secular Judaism that celebrated Jewish peoplehood, Jewish history, Yiddish songs and Yiddish literature." While attending the University of British Columbia, he took a course in post-biblical Judaism that enlarged his perspective on Judaism. "I was excited by what I learned," he says. "Jews were not liberals who were always on the side of the underdog. They were diverse. The Jewish experience in Spain differed from the Jewish experience in the Mideast, which differed from the Jewish experience in Poland, which was very different than the Jewish experience in the U.S. "It fascinated me." He also developed a close relationship with the Hillel rabbi, who imparted additional insight to the intelligent young man. "Little by little I started adding religious and historical pieces to the Yiddishist cultural Judaism I grew up with," he says now. Always interested in teaching, Rabbi Field eventually entered the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College to pursue the rabbinate. Dr. Arthur Green, who was president of RRC at that time and now heads the non- denominational Hebrew College in Boston, "once described Reconstructionism as Jewish religious humanism," Rabbi Field says. "This concept allowed me to remain deeply rooted in my humanism while expanding my spiritual vocabulary."
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After his 1994 ordination, he served as the rabbi in a new Reconstructionist congregation in New Jersey. Two years later, he became the first rabbi at a Reconstructionist-Renewal congregation in Madison, Wis., which he served for six years. "That's where I learned that the part of the rabbinate which excited me most was working with people who were challenged by traditional Judaism," says Rabbi Field, "people who still wanted to engage in Judaism but needed some help." In 2002, he became the first non-Christian chaplain at a large Catholic health care conglomerate in Madison and Milwaukee. "I enjoyed the work--meeting individuals where they were." Two years later, Rabbi Field heard about plans to start Judaism Your Way in Denver. He accepted the position because it meant he "could have a rabbinate that would be based on reaching out, working with people at the edges of Judaism and expanding the reach of Judaism itself. "I'm very happy with this job," says Rabbi Field, who married Debbie Zucker in 1995 and is the father of a 10-year-old daughter. "It feels perfect for me." Being warm and welcoming is commendable, Rabbi Field says of communal efforts to accommodate the Jewishly disenfranchised and the intermarried. But it's hardly sufficient. "Warm and welcoming behavior is really just being a good host," he says. "And most of us know how to be good hosts." He applauds synagogues that have created energized programming to attract more members, and is very pleased that interfaith groups are available at almost every liberal congregation in Denver. But Judaism Your Way--and Rabbi Field--would like to steer the conversation in another direction. He suggests that non-Jews who fully embrace their spouses' Judaism might embody G-d's attempt to begin healing the Jewish psyche of inner traumas carved by centuries of persecution. "Whether a Jew is 65 or 40 or 35, the painful legacy of what it means to be Jewish sits with us. I'm the parent of a Jewish child. How long before (the historical negatives) become part of how a child defines his or her Jewishness?" In the interfaith groups he leads, Rabbi Field hears the Jewish partner "invariably articulate" a negative legacy of Judaism that is influenced by anti-Semitism, the Holocaust and endless wrongs committed against the Jewish people. "But the non-Jewish partner will invariably respond, 'It goes without question that our child will be raised Jewish,' or 'Judaism will be a large part of who they are.' I hear Christians speak with enthusiasm and love and respect about the gifts of Judaism again and again. "Maybe this is G-d's way of helping heal the Jews of all the traumas they've suffered. Maybe, in the words of Torah, there are ways to think of ourselves other than as a people who dwell apart." Reflecting on Judaism Your Way's ultimate goal, Rabbi Field mentions Abraham and Sarah, whom the Talmudic rabbis traditionally identify with the mitzvah of hospitality. "There were openings on all four sides of their tent so no one would have to struggle to get inside," Rabbi Field explains, then pauses. "What would a four-sided, tented Judaism look like?" he asks, a vivid smile spreading over his intense features. "This is what Judaism Your Way is trying to do."
Andrea Jacobs is a senior writer for Intermountain Jewish News.
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Why We Call them Intercultural Weddings: a Secular ARTICLE ARCHIVE Humanistic Jewish Approach Life-Cycle Ceremonies By Miriam Jerris Birth Ceremonies When Jews are about to intermarry, they confront their feelings about their Jewish identity. Bar and Bat Mitzvah This is a critical and vulnerable moment. If the Jewish community turns them away, they may never again identify with the Jewish people. Approaches to Interfaith Weddings The Secular Humanistic Jewish position on intermarriage responds to the needs of Jews who have decided to intermarry by helping them create a marriage ceremony that affirms elements Parents and Interfaith Weddings of the backgrounds of each member of the couple. Rabbis and Interfaith Weddings Intercultural marriage is the term I use to describe the marriage of a Jew to someone from another religious tradition. Intercultural marriage acknowledges that while the backgrounds of Death and Mourning the partners differ, their love is based on shared values. These values may derive from Holidays different sources, but feel compatible to the partners. Interfaith marriage, a term we prefer not to use, suggests an attempt to join, or marry, two different belief systems. This difference may Relationships be semantic, but it is emotionally valid. Intercultural marriage places the difference in the past, not the present. Spirituality Secular Humanistic Jewish clergy not only accept intermarriage as a fact, but also support the Arts and Entertainment right of the partners to make a marital choice based on their love for each other. Our rabbis and leaders (ordained clergy) officiate joyfully at ceremonies when one partner is not Jewish News and Opinion and co-officiate with representatives of other religious traditions. When I co-officiate, I follow these Secular Humanistic Jewish guidelines: I ask that the ceremony be a blended one that InterfaithFamily.com includes symbols and traditions from both backgrounds; that the ceremony be equally shared between the two clergy; and that Christian clergy use language common to both traditions-- InterfaithFamily.com Magazine Past Issues By Year specifically, that the theistic language refer only to God only, not to Jesus. Dignity and integrity exist in a marriage ceremony only when the people involved in the CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA relationship are acknowledged authentically for who they are. In preparation for the wedding, I encourage couples to reflect on their own identities. Planning a wedding is an opportunity for BLOGS them to reevaluate their connection to their heritage and discover what is important to them. DISCUSSION BOARDS Often the partners have never discussed their feelings about their heritage with one another. This is an ideal time to address these issues and develop communication skills to deal with NEWS AND ADVOCACY them. I encourage couples to be open and honest with one another. I also encourage them to ask their parents about their needs and expectations. I ask them to listen to their parents and ABOUT IFF then to make a decision based on their own needs, while considering their parents' feelings. Ultimately, the couple must decide for themselves what they wish to do at their ceremony. If PRESS ROOM they make choices different from their parents' requests, I encourage them to lovingly tell their parents what choices they have made, and that the choices were based on their own needs STORE and the needs of each family. Many couples place a high value on equality and want their ceremony to equally represent each of their backgrounds. Although they may not personally share the beliefs of their families, they do respect them and want to show their respect. Usually, each member of the Find couple wants something familiar from his or her tradition included in the ceremony, and powered by FreeFind neither wants an encounter with anything that would feel uncomfortable. In striving for equality, it is rare for either member of the couple to consider conversion. Secular Humanistic Jewish ceremonies are creative and personal. A new ceremony is typically created for each couple based on its unqiue needs and desires. From the Jewish tradition, we might have a chuppah (wedding canopy) under which the couple is married and a cup of wine from which they drink. From the Christian tradition, they may light a unity candle, give flowers to their mothers, and read from texts they find meaningful--whether a favorite poem, excerpt from the Bible, lyrics of a much-loved song, or something they have written themselves. I always explain the meaning of the symbols so that they will not seem alien to those from a different tradition.
The focus of the ceremony is on the individuals being married and the partnership they are creating, their connection to family and to their heritage. I celebrate their love with them and
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Featured their families. While I am willing to officiate either in a temple or a church, I believe that a Partners/Funders/Links neutral setting is preferable for an intercultural marriage. The greatest concern is always about future children. Although I recommend that couples begin the process of discussing how they want to raise their children, I am realistic enough to know that they cannot make the decision before they actually have a child. We never know how we will feel about something until we are experiencing the situation. To make a promise Login to a prospective spouse or future in-laws about raising children in one tradition or another and then discovering that you cannot live with that decision could promote feelings of severe betrayal, something we want to protect these couples from. Login Name: Secular Humanistic Judaism has a distinctive approach to intercultural marriage, one that respectfully acknowledges each partner in the union and provides a warm and embracing Password: environment for both the Jewish and the non-Jewish partner to raise their children within the Jewish community. What do you think?
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Miriam Jerris is the Director of the Intermarriage Department of the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism (IISJH). She holds Masters Degrees in both Near Eastern Studies and Humanistic and Clinical Psychology. She is a rabbinic student in the Rabbinic Program of the IISHJ and will be ordained in October, 2001. She is also a Doctoral Candidate in Jewish Studies at The Union Institute. Ms. Jerris is a Sr. Leader (Clergy) and has been officiating at marriage ceremonies for more than sixteen years.
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CURRENT WEB MAGAZINE ISSUE Interfaith Celebrities: Five Beautiful Women, A Violinist and One Caveman ARTICLE ARCHIVE By Nate Bloom Life-Cycle Ceremonies The Most Beautiful People in the World? Holidays People magazine recently came out with their Relationships annual "100 Most Beautiful People in the World" issue. Five of the persons judged the most beautiful Spirituality were actresses with interfaith backgrounds: Scarlett Arts and Entertainment Johansson, Rachel Bilson, Amanda Bynes, Rashida Jones, and Zoe Kravitz. Books I am not sure what to make of this without going off Films, Theater, TV and Music into all sorts of sociological tangents. Two fairly simple points come to mind. First, there are a lot Interviews and Profiles more persons of mixed Jewish and non-Jewish ancestry around today than 25 years ago. News and Opinion Therefore, there are more interfaith actresses. Also, I think that these five actresses demonstrate that InterfaithFamily.com American film/TV standards of beauty are a lot more InterfaithFamily.com Magazine Past wide-open than they were a generation or so ago Issues By Year when casting directors obviously favored actresses of clear Northern European ancestry, those with CONNECTIONS IN YOUR AREA what was considered the "All-American look." Johansson, whose American mother is of Eastern BLOGS European Jewish ancestry and whose father is a Danish non-Jew, has the blonde bombshell look that DISCUSSION BOARDS long has been a casting director and American public favorite. Her features would have been more Rashida Jones, who is gaining fame as NEWS AND ADVOCACY than acceptable a generation or more ago… and Karen on NBC's "The Office," is the they still are quite acceptable. daughter of musical legend Quincy Jones ABOUT IFF and Jewish actress Peggy Lipton of "Mod Squad" fame. To no one's surprise, People However, Bilson, whose father is Jewish, and whose magazine named her one of the 100 Most PRESS ROOM mother is Italian Catholic, has a smoky Beautiful People in the World. Mediterranean look. Bynes, whose mother is REUTERS/Fred Prouser STORE Jewish, looks sort of generic American, but not "glamour girl" blonde. Rashida Jones looks vaguely Mediterranean, but her beauty is an amalgam of her handsome non-Jewish black father, famous musician Quincy Jones, and her beautiful Jewish mother, actress Peggy Lipton of "Mod Squad" TV fame. Lipton was as Find willowy a WASP-looking blonde as you can find and that look served her well in the '60s. powered by FreeFind Rashida Jones is now co-starring on "The Office," the TV series. Zoe Kravitz, who at 18 is just beginning an acting/modeling career, has the most exotic ethnic/religious background of all, although her looks are decidedly African-American. Her father, musician Lenny Kravitz, is the son of a white, Jewish father and a black, non-Jewish woman (the late actress Roxie Roker). Zoe's mother, actress Lisa Bonet, of "Cosby Show" fame, is the daughter of a white Jewish mother and a black, non-Jewish father.
Obviously, one can also use these actresses to demonstrate that the "look" of the Jewish community, broadly defined, is changing. While none of them are religion, as far as I know none of them adhere to a faith other than Judaism. Therefore, most demographers would count them as "Jewish."
Whether a casting director would ever give them a Jewish part is another question entirely. I strongly suspect that most casting directors are still casting Jewish roles based on a vaguely "Semitic" look and have not caught up with the changing face of "Jewish beauty." Joshua Bell: Bar Mitzvah at 39? Featured Joshua Bell, 39, has long been acclaimed as one of the best and most exciting violinists in Partners/Funders/Links the world. Early last month, Bell was given the $75,000 Avery Fisher Prize, presented by the family of the late Avery Fisher, the Jewish founder of the famous Fisher Stereo company and
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a great patron of the arts. (The philharmonic concert hall at Lincoln Center in New York is named after Fisher, who paid for its complete restoration.)
This is not the first time Bell received an Avery Fisher award. When he was a teenager in Login Indiana, he got a call from Avery Fisher himself, telling Bell that he had won an Avery Fisher Career Grant. These grants help young American classical musicians start a career. Login Name: Actress Glenn Close said as she presented the prize to Bell at Lincoln Center, ''One of Joshua's great gifts is that although he may be performing in a huge auditorium packed with hundreds or even thousands of people, each member of that audience feels as if they were Password: the only person in the room. It's a complex, thrilling deeply personal communication that can leave us permanently rearranged.'' Bell is the son of a non-Jewish father and a Jewish mother. While he was raised without religion, he has made it clear in a number of interviews that he considers himself "culturally Not Signed Up? Find Out More. Jewish." In his acceptance speech, he recalled his family's musical connections: his mother Shirley and his aunt Esther playing four-hand piano and his uncle Yitz, a clarinet player. Bell was choked up with emotion as he said, referring to the Avery Fisher Prize, "This is my Bar Mitzvah. I never had a Bar Mitzvah." Captain Caveman and the Connie Corleone Last November, TBS premiered the original sit-com "Ten Items or Less." The five-episode series was a hit with critics and audiences and will be back this summer. "Ten Items" stars comedian John Lehr, 40, as a bumbler who takes over his family's supermarket after his father's death. His management style makes for a chaotically comic workplace. Lehr also co-writes "Ten Items." In 2003, Lehr told the Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles about his unusual path to Judaism. He described himself as an alcoholic from a "hillybilly Kansas white- trash family." He became sober in 1996 and began a comedy stand-up career. However, he still battled demons which led his Jewish girlfriend, now his wife, to put him in touch with her rabbi. The rabbi suggested Judaism classes, including Jewish meditation courses. The meditation classes gave Lehr some emotional peace and he converted to Judaism in 2000. Lehr added that he needed to be circumcised to complete his conversion. Actress Talia Shire (L) is not Jewish but both her first Well, he had the procedure in Hollywood and second husbands were Jewish. She had one son, and, sure enough, his mohel asked Lehr Matthew (second from R), with her first husband, film composer David Shire, and two sons, Robert (second whether he had read the mohel's son's from L) and Jason (R), of Rushmore fame, with her late movie script--while Lehr's pants were still second husband, film executive around his ankles! Fortunately, the newly Jack Schwartzman. REUTERS minted Jew saw the humor in the situation. Lehr also stars as one of the cavemen in the very popular Geico auto insurance ads. The ads are such a hit that ABC just commissioned a pilot for a TV series starring the cavemen. However, Lehr is committed to "Ten Items" and will not be in the pilot. (The creator of the Geico ads says they give Lehr free rein to improvise as they shoot his Geico ads because what he comes up with is usually funnier than the script). Like most modern humans, I find it difficult to tell which actor is playing a particular caveman. However, I am sure that it is Lehr in the ads in which the caveman is talking to his therapist. The therapist, by the way, is played by actress Talia Shire, best known for playing Sylvester Stallone's wife in the "Rocky" movies. She was born Talia Coppolla and is the sister of famous director Francis Coppola. The Coppolas are an Italian Catholic family. Talia Shire's first husband was Jewish film composer David Shire, and she kept his name after they divorced. Her second husband was the late Jewish film executive Jack Schwartzman. They were married from 1980 until his death in 1994 and had two sons, actor/musician Robert Carmine and actor/musician Jason Schwartzman, of Rushmore fame. In one interview, Jason Schwartzman indicated that he was raised without religion, but did add that he loved matzo ball soup.
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Nate Bloom writes a column on Jewish celebrities, broadly defined, that appears in five Jewish newspapers. If you have any comments or wish to republish parts of this article, please contact Bloom via [email protected].
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