Leaders of Conservative Judaism press for change as movement's numbers drop.

[bemildred]

---

The Rabbinical Assembly, the clerical arm of Conservative Judaism, would have you believe the second message, or something like it. That's why it launched its 2011 convention with a martini reception at a Las Vegas synagogue. The gathering was billed as an attempt to "rebrand" the Conservative movement, which has seen alarming declines in membership in recent years.

"We are in deep trouble," Rabbi Edward Feinstein of congregation Valley Beth Shalom in Encino told the convention the next day. "There isn't a single demographic that is encouraging for the future of Conservative Judaism. Not one."

Those words could apply equally to a number of U.S. religious denominations, especially liberal Protestant and Jewish faiths. Membership is falling; churches and synagogues are struggling financially; and surveys show robust growth among the ranks of those who declare no religious affiliation.

The situation may be especially alarming to the Conservative movement because it was, for many years, the largest denomination in American Judaism. It was the solid center, more traditional than Reform, more open to change than Orthodoxy.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-conservative-jews-20110412,0,4863581.story

[BonnieJW]

1. They should try lowering their membership fees.

Or putting them on a sliding scale. No one can afford to belong to a synagogue anymore.

[Ken Burch]

13. Maybe a different name would help

How about "Moderate Judaism"? That would actually be a more accurate description of their status, which represents a halfway point between the Orthodox and Reform strains.

Or they could re-purpose a bit of Anglican/Episcopalian terminology and call themselves "Broad Temple".

[shaayecanaan]

18. Good post...

I got a chuckle out of that one. Moderate Judaism isn't bad.

"Anglican Judaism"...has a nice ring to it, I suppose.

[King_David]

2. This is News from Israel/Palestine?

[Ken Burch]

14. It's fits there at least as much as reports on antisemitic incidents in the Diaspora

They, too, have nothing to do with the I/P forum, since you don't have to defend the hardline Israeli position towards Palestinians to be offended by such incidents and to be involved with working against them.

[King_David]

16. I agree Israel is The Jewish state ,thats why it belongs here.

[King_David]

3. I read that the Yiddish language is gradually loosing ground another words its dying is this true?

I read that the Yiddish language is gradually loosing ground another words its dying is this true?
How is the Yiddish language dying and why?

Is it going to try to increase?

I hate to see the Yiddish language die out because its such a beautiful language GEEZ



http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080902205153AAAd3iE

[King_David]

4. The Jewish vote really does count

The Jewish vote really does countHistory suggests British Jewish leaders are wrong to shy away from the notion of distinctive voting patterns among Jews


Share17 Comments (39)
Geoffrey Alderman guardian.co.uk, Monday 19 April 2010 12.37 BST Article historyIn the early 1970s, as I researched a textbook on the British electoral system, I became aware of a very significant gap in the then existing literature on voting habits among the British electorate. A great deal of material existed, naturally, on socio-economic class and its electoral impact. There was some material – not as much as there might have been – on the relationship between religion and voting. And some research had been carried out into the Irish vote – research that was principally an offshoot of the much greater body of research into "the Irish question". But on the relationship between ethnicity and voting there was very little indeed. I was determined to repair this omission, and began polling Jewish voting intentions in selected London constituencies.


A phone call reached me from an organisation calling itself the Board of Deputies of British Jews. I was invited to lunch with its so-called defence department. And at that lunch I was ordered – repeat ordered – to cease forthwith my investigation of Jewish voting habits. Jews, I was told, voted just like everyone else. To poll a sample of Jews was to poll a sample of "ordinary" voters – no more and no less. So what was the point of my efforts? Besides, my hosts added, to ask how Jews were going to vote, or had voted, was to plant in the minds of the non-Jewish community, among whom we British Jews lived, the idea that Jews were not fully integrated into British society. I was told that Jews, in fact, were fully integrated. There was, therefore, no "Jewish dimension" to an election, and to suggest otherwise was to place the entirety of British Jewry in some (ill-defined) jeopardy.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/apr/19/jewish-vote-really-does-count

[azurnoir]

5. wonder if this is part of the reason

Intermarriage among Conservative Jews alone has tripled since 1960 and increasing.

Strong commitment to real Jewish education and observance leads to less intermarriage and assimilation. Those Jews (observant or otherwise) whose children attended Jewish day school have an intermarriage rate of no greater than 2% depending on years of education as follows:

*

52% of those children attending Jewish day school until grade 6, will intermarry.
*

16% of those children attending Jewish day school until grade 9, will intermarry.
*

2% of those children attending Jewish day school until grade 12, will intermarry.
*

72% of the children of intermarried couples will not be nor will they consider themselves Jewish (60% will practice other religions - 40% no religion at all).

Today over 1/3 of the U.S. Jewish population are intermarried. Only one in ten children in an intermarried family will marry a Jew. In households where neither parent received formal Jewish education, only one in seven children are being raised as Jewish.

Today there are more children under age 4 in mixed- marriage households than children in households where both parents are Jewish.

It is clear that almost all the children of intermarried couples eventually will leave the Jewish faith.

http://www.jewishpost.com/archives/news/a-new-demographic-pioneer-research-of-the-american-jewry-21st-century.html#top

[bemildred]

6. I don't think it's particularly Jewish.

It's worth considering that 3rd paragraph I posted. But yeah, intermarriage is part of it. What it indicates (IMHO) is a lack of interest in keeping things separate, people do not feel obliged to cling to the old ways. For example, here in the USA, being white and protestant doesn't buy you what it used to. When I was a kid, to marry inter-racially or inter-religiously (not just protestants marrying protestants) was a much bigger deal than it would be now.

[azurnoir]

7. I chose that because the subject of the OP is Judaism

but generally speaking most conservative religious movements are shrinking, and you very correct about intermarriage of just about any kind not being as big a deal as it used to be

[bemildred]

8. Yeah, some people will interpret this as a "failure" is a Jewish/Israeli context.

But I think that is too narrow a view, it's not a local issue, and the notion that one could just thwart it in the particular case is likewise too narrow.

[LeftishBrit]

20. They are not 'conservative' in quite the same way as 'conservative Christians'

They are in between Orthodox and Reform Jews as regards level of traditionalism.

[azurnoir]

21. not to be rude but duh

as far as I have experienced it is 'average' Judaism not too hot ie don't have to clean youroven with a blow torch, or wear a wig if your a women but do keep 2 sets of dishes and utensils, not too cold no BLT's or shrimp cocktails

sorry just got up no coffee yet

[shaayecanaan]

9. I think thats exactly correct...

Conservative Judaism is sort of like the Jewish version of the Anglican (Episcopalian) church. If you wanted to hang out with your WASP friends at the Knickerbocker club, Reform was a bit too hippie and Orthodox was a bit too ethnic. Conservative seemed just right.

In the same way that Anglicanism is halfway between the Catholics and the Unitarians, Conservative Judaism was something of a comfortable halfway house.

This mirrors the sense in which the Episcopalian church is also struggling for relevance and numbers in today's society. It is too liberal for some and too traditional for others.

[bemildred]

10. Well, more deeply, nowadays, the issue is a pragmatic one.

"Which lifestyle works the best for you?"
You can try different things, your money is welcome anywhere.
This is not true everywhere, yet, but it is largely true in "The West".
:hi:

[shaayecanaan]

11. Yes, that is true...people shop around for religions these days...

I don't know if Madonna is going to be converting to Anglicanism or Conservative Judaism any time soon. These religions were never intended to appeal to newcomers, they were intended to do the opposite, to preserve social cachet.

There is an old boys' club in my hometown that I have grudgingly attended on several past occasions. They have vamped up their menu and were offering teriyaki and such on the last occasion. I thought that this was rather desperate and sad, like mutton dressing up as lamb.

I should probably note for fairness' sake that the Lebanese Catholic Church is doing no better. Hard to get Lebanese lads to join the clergy these days. Who would go through all that garbage to make no money and not have sex for the rest of your life?

Many of the mainstream Catholic churches already have Indian and African clergy, people who are willing to do the job for the increased living standards and job security. Perhaps in time even the ethnic Catholic churches will have to do the same (the Lebanese, the Croatians and the Maltese). That would have been unthinkable even a few years ago.

[bemildred]

12. I have a female cousin with fundy Baptist origins that went Catholic.

For social reasons, AFAI can tell. Religion is a contentious issue among different branches of my family, so it's avoided. My wife is Jewish when she feels like it, and Buddhist when she doesn't, and she likes Yoga a lot. And I like her fine. The truth is the world we live in is a strange place, and we have no clue what is really going on, but we occur naturally, so there is no need to get worked up. I have great skepticism about the notion that the deity worries a lot about me, and I'm Ok with that, being important is way overrated in my view.

[Ken Burch]

15. I've always wondered whether being opposed to intermarriage is a good thing

Are the consequences of it terrible enough that they're worth forcing children to be subjected to living in a house with parents who can barely stand each other just so that it could be said that both of the parents married "within the faith". and where the parents may always nurse bitterness at being denied the right to marry the people they ACTUALLY loved?

How do you oppose intermarriage without going all the way back to ugly 19th Century-style arranged marriages, the kind where everyone was pretty much guaranteed to be miserable?

[shaayecanaan]

17. I dare say that most of the endogamous religions will have to change or die...

Judaism is not so bad in this respect, at least it accepts converts. The Druzes, the Yazidis, Mendaeans, Zoroastrians etc don't accept converts, and will probably have to change that real quick if they want to hang on in this modern age.

Personally, I don't know that I have much sympathy for them. If they want to beef up their numbers then they can get out there and do a membership drive just like all the other religions.

[houstonintc]

22. Actually...

It't usually the tight knit and fairly closed groups that are the most resilient.

Judaism survived far greater strains and external threats while being a fairly closed, internal, group that made conversion difficult.

Also one should not that while Reform and Conservative are dying, Orthodox and Ultra-Orthodox are booming, in many countries Orthodox Jews will be the majority of the Jews. In Israel and the UK it's well on it's way.

[shaayecanaan]

23. Judaism hasn't been an endogamous sect for nearly as long as some of the others...

in fact it accepted converts (particularly female spouses) quite readily until fairly recently..

The Zoroastrians have been strictly endogamous for the best part of a thousand years - unless you have both a Zoroastrian mother and father you are not considered part of the community. Tight knit, maybe, but the problem is that over time you start to see serious problems from in-breeding, particularly mental illness which is very common amongst Zoroastrians.

[houstonintc]

25. I'd ask for some sources...

Unless you define recent in the thousands of years, conversion has been a trickle at best for most of recent Jewish History which I count in centuries.

[Shaktimaan]

19. Interesting post.

It brings three things to mind.

Firstly, as a mid-30s New York Jew who has recently found himself single and dating again this is something that I've thought a lot about. How important is it to me that I end up with someone who is Jewish? It's complicated. While I loathe the idea of excluding anyone based on something stupid like religion, (esp since I'm not at all religious), I have found that dating Jewish women has been "easier" in terms of having shared cultural experiences. It's certainly made any thoughts of marriage and children easier. My last LT girlfriend was Israeli, and despite the vast cultural differences there I found that we had more in common culturally than I did with many Christian NY'ers I had dated. So while I would never exclude myself from dating gentiles, I did surprise myself in realizing that I'd probably end up with a Jewish woman. (Postscript: I've been in a relationship now with someone who is 3/4 Jewish for about 6 months. She gets all of the Jew stuff with the bonus that I got to celebrate my first Christmas this past December. And dude, Christmas is awesome! I got a fire truck! Rock!)

Secondly, I disagree with your assessment that arranged marriages are destined for misery. Having spent a decent amount of time in India I had a lot of discussions with native Indians about the differences in our marriage traditions. Most marriages there are still arranged by the parents and it took me awhile to accept it as a different yet not necessarily inferior path to take. Hey, half of all US marriages end in divorce, right? Far less than in India. And while there are many different, complex cultural mores at work preventing us from making any kind of direct comparison, I wouldn't be so quick to judge an entire continent's belief system without further investigation on your part.

Lastly there's a fascinating NYT article about a group of Syrian Jews in Brooklyn dedicated to the idea of cultural purity. Here's a review and a link to the actual article. It's worth reading, I found it unbelievable.

The recent NYT Magazine article by Zev Chafets on the rich and rapidly growing enclave of 75,000 Syrian Jews in Brooklyn is quite fascinating. Unlike some other Orthodox Jewish groups, they dress in modern clothes, which facilitates their making a huge amount of money as merchants. (Some had forged close business ties with the late Sam Walton, the founder of Wal-Mart). Under an Edict put forward in 1935 and most recently reaffirmed by community leaders in 2006, they utterly ostracize anybody who marries a Gentile, along with their descendants.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/14/magazine/14syrians-t.html?_r=1&ref=magazine&pagewanted=all

[shaayecanaan]

24. Thats a fascinating article, and well worth reading...

there's a lot in there that struck a chord with me.

My tribe (the Lebanese) followed the same rule book as these guys on how to get rich - make sure there's money coming in, and no money going out. You'd have these huge extended families in the one house, with the matriarch of the family doing the shopping for the whole bunch - in effect spending very little on housing and on food.

You were expected to work in the family business, for free, until you had a business of your own. Usually this was a restaurant or some other retail business. Virtually every Leb business paid nothing in wages because every person working in the shop was an extended family member. And of course that meant that hardly any money was declared to the tax man.

Of course, the system has its limits. If too many people try to get wealthy by reducing their consumption to rock-bottom then the whole capitalist system crumbles, because after all someone has to spend money in order for the system to keep going. Its just like the old Jewish joke: "Why did God invent gentiles?" Answer: Someone has to buy retail.

I also doubt that any tribe can be an island forever. I think that the kicker is language - once children stop speaking Arabic, then the process of assimilation happens quite quickly.