We need to do so much more for intermarried

How shall we outreach to them and relate to them? Shall rabbis be officiating at the wedding of a gentile and a Jew? The Reform movement’s answer continues to be: Let each rabbi decide according to conscience. The Conservative movement is undergoing its own self-examinations on the subject. The Orthodox: Forget it.

In the Reform movement, some congregations vigorously refuse to engage a rabbi who on principle will not officiate at an interfaith wedding; other congregations every bit as vigorously refuse to engage a rabbi who will.

One can argue, good: elu v’elu, these and these are correct. The widest net catches the most. The feeling in San Francisco was not that our 21st-century Judaism is at stake. Merely, that there is much work to be done.

One reality, well recognized in rabbinical circles, is: What should rabbis who do not officiate at interfaith weddings do so that couples will not be left on their own?

After all, the meetings about a wedding must develop into a discussion that includes rabbinic guidance concerning the marriage and, so very important, what to expect of a marriage of a Jew and a non-Jew given the particular couple’s circumstances. Such a discussion is unlikely if the couple seeks another officiant.

For a long time, to avoid a serious and perhaps irreparable rift in the Reform movement, there was an understandable unwillingness to answer the question: Why do you or why do you not officiate at weddings of a Jew and a potential ger toshav, someone who lives among Jews.

That reluctance translated into a neglected agenda. Now it is catch-up time; many essential elements at issue — extremely complicated to be sure — can no longer be tabled, deferred or overlooked entirely.

• A Jewish-non-Jewish polarity cannot long be sustained in 21st-century America, seeing that there are so many who constitute our loving eruv rav, the mixed or intermarried “multitude” who are part of us. They are clearly not gentiles in the previous meaning of that term. They are another category.

• The consequences of not recognizing the legitimate needs of the ger toshav family in the synagogue. What is to be lost and what gained were we to allow, if not encourage, the non-Jewish partner(s) to stand alongside his or her child at life-cycle events within the synagogue sanctuary.

Because they are ger toshav and not Jews; because they have only converged, but not converted, are they to be excluded from participation in family life-cycle events in shul?

• That certain rabbis have decided for themselves that they will not participate in an interfaith wedding and, furthermore, no other rabbi should — and, therefore, they give no referrals.

Among the issues that I believe deserves very much more attention are the reasons that rabbis who do not, in good conscience, officiate at intermarriages also do not feel obligated to refer a couple or family to a rabbi colleague who does.

The latter may be a “specialist” — a qualified, experienced counselor, a rabbi with integrity as opposed to a rabbi who is making a living at it. The first spend some eight to 10 hours with a couple in sessions — adhering to a well thought-out of approach — while for others, according to my research, there is one meeting, two at most.

The focus for these practitioners is on the wedding. For the former, the focus is on the marriage.

We have to do better, so these couples do not end up raising Unitarians with a Jewish parent as opposed to raising Jewish kids with an all-but-a-Jewish parent.

The rabbis in San Francisco reached the square marked start. Step one lies ahead. To get at start with such warmth and menschlichkeit may be as significant and historical as any efforts to address what has thus far been neglected.

What comes next? Earnest dialogue, real discussion, even fairly held debate?

Perhaps for the Reform movement (and the rabbis of goodwill in the other movements), the time has come, as in the therapy session ending the book, Portnoy’s Complaint, to say, “now ve begin.”

Reeve Brenner is the rabbi of Congregation Bet Chesed in Bethesda, Md., and author of Jewish, Christian, Chewish or Eschewish? Interfaith Marriage Pathways for the New Millennium. This article originally appeared in the Washington Jewish Week.