Where may non-Jewish parents stand in the synagogue during their children’s bar/bat mitzvah ceremonies? Can a non-Jew open the ark? Should non-Jewish synagogue members have voting rights?
Such questions have been pushed to the fore by the growing percentage of Conservative homes that include non-Jewish family members — more than one-quarter of them, according to the recent Pew Research Center survey.
For many Conservative synagogues, the issues cut to the heart of a philosophical and practical debate about how open they should be toward the non-Jews in their midst.
“For a variety of reasons, my colleagues are being challenged to rethink positions that in the past we accepted almost as dogma,” said Rabbi Charles Simon.
As executive director of the Conservative movement’s Federation of Jewish Men’s Clubs, Simon organizes seminars for Conservative synagogues on how to be more inclusive of non-Jews.
“It doesn’t mean that the standards of Conservative Judaism are changing,” he continued. “It means that my colleagues are metaphorically learning they have to broaden their own tents.”
The dilemma is not unique to Conservative Judaism. The Reform movement has grappled with some of the same issues.
But Reform synagogues are not bound by Jewish law, and the movement accepts intermarriage — two key distinctions from Conservative Judaism.
On the Orthodox side, the line against non-Jewish participation is pretty clear. Many strictly Orthodox synagogues won’t even allow the Jewish partner in an interfaith marriage to lead services.
Conservative synagogues are navigating the middle. They wrestle with how to adapt to increasing numbers of non-Jews in their ranks while adhering to Conservative principles of Jewish law that, among other things, forbid intermarriage.
The discussions also come at a time of serious decline for the Conservative movement, whose share of the U.S. Jewish population has fallen to 18 percent, according to the Pew study.
“Since such a large percentage of our younger families include interfaith marriages and relationships, we want very much to keep our children as loyal and involved Conservative Jews, and we realize that in order to do so we need to be welcoming to their partners and spouses and families,” said Rabbi Raphael Adler of the Woodbury Jewish Center in New York.
“Many in our congregations are not willing to give up our children and our families to Reform synagogues or to no congregation at all. It seems wrong,” Adler said.
The ways Conservative synagogues are adapting vary widely. Many offer non-Jews the honor of reciting the English prayer for the government, Israel or peace. Some allow non-Jews voting rights, but bar them from board positions. Others exclude them from membership.
During life-cycle events, many Conservative synagogues now offer non-Jews a place of honor, but with limitations.
At the Woodbury synagogue, non-Jewish parents may join their Jewish spouses when receiving an aliyah to the Torah during a bar mitzvah service, but the non-Jew must take a couple of steps back when blessings are recited.
Adler says reaction to the changes has been mixed. Some members have threatened to quit if certain changes are adopted.
Rabbi David Booth of Kol Emeth in Palo Alto, Calif., recently began giving non-Jews in his congregation a stand-alone ritual role unconnected to life-cycle events: opening the ark. Recently, the Conservative movement’s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards formally endorsed the practice.
At Congregation Kneses Tifereth Israel in Port Chester, N.Y., Rabbi Jaymee Alpert offers a public blessing to interfaith couples right before their wedding in an adaptation of the traditional Shabbat “aufruf” celebration that precedes a Jewish wedding. Alpert also presents the interfaith couple with the same synagogue gift bestowed upon Jewish couples.
“We should be as open and inclusive as possible within the parameters of Jewish law and the Conservative movement,” she said. “It’s not that the congregation is advocating intermarriage, but I think there’s a little bit of acceptance that this happens; and don’t we want our children and the next generation to feel comfortable in the synagogue?”
Alpert said she finds it painful to have to explain to interfaith couples why she cannot officiate at their weddings. Though the Conservative movement also bars its rabbis from attending intermarriages, the rule often is ignored.
Like many Conservative clergymen in Canada, Rabbi Jarrod Grover of Beth Tikvah Synagogue in Toronto considers intermarriage a breach of Conservative Judaism.
“We do not recognize the validity of intermarriages — period,” Grover said.
He believes the best way to welcome non-Jews and encourage them to raise a Jewish family is to lower the bar for conversion.
“The danger of making the shul too welcoming for the intermarried is that there stops being any reason to convert, and I don’t want that,” Grover told JTA. “I want to push conversion because the right way to raise Jewish children is with two Jewish parents.”
Rabbi Stewart Vogel of Temple Aliyah in Los Angeles rejects that approach.
Vogel’s synagogue doesn’t just welcome interfaith families but celebrates them. Vogel even officiates at funerals for non-Jewish congregants. Vogel’s synagogue also allows non-Jewish spouses who have lost their Jewish spouse or divorced to remain a member of the congregation.
“Some of my most committed congregants are non-Jewish congregants,” he said.
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