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Friday, March 27, 1987

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

OP-ED

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Reform Movement

Continued from Page 7

it only turns them away from
the synagogue."
According to Mel Merrians
of Larchmont, N.Y., rabbis
should solemnize mixed mar-
riages "only if the partners
have agreed to study Judaism
seriously, maintain a Jewish
home and rear their children
as Jews." Merrians criticizes
those rabbis who co-officiate
with Christian clergy. "I
don't think you can be mar-
ried within two religous tra-
ditions," he says.
Among the Reform rabbis
who officiate at weddings be-
tween Jews and non-Jews,
most insist that the couple
commit themselves to main-
taining a Jewish home, join-
ing a temple and rearing the
children as Jews. Some, like
Rabbi Harry Danziger of
Memphis, require that the
couple study the same pro-
gram as those. preparing for
conversion. These rabbis be-
lieve that officiating at an in-
terfaith wedding brings the
couple closer to the
synagogue and to Judaism.
Rabbi Danziger says, "I see
them after the wedding just
as often as I see Jews who
marry Jews."
Recent Jewish community
studies indicate that approx-
imately one in three Jews
currently enters marriage
with a partner who was not
born Jewish. Yet, despite this
rise in the frequency of
Jewish marriages, fewer rab-
bis appear willing to solem-
nize mixed marriage cere-
monies than might have done
so 15 years ago. The trend is
particularly notable among
rabbinic students. Dr. Alfred
Gottschalk, president of the
Hebrew Union College-
Jewish Institute of Religion,
sees the tendency away from
officiation as "the temper of
the times." Unlike rabbinic
students in earlier genera-
tions, most students now
come from Reform homes but
in many respects feel closer
to traditional Judaism.
Rabbi Bernat of Miami de-
clines to officiate at interfaith
weddings out of ideological
conviction. But he also be-
lieves that his converts have
a special claim on him as the
guardian of the boundaries of
the Jewish people. He rea-
sons, "Were I to officiate,
could they not confront me
with, 'How can you give to
those unwilling to make our
commitment the same bene-
fits and sacred privileges?' "
Many thousands of others
not born to Judaism are mar-
ried to Jews affiliated with
Reform temples. Although
they may not convert for-
mally to Judaism, they rear
their children as Jews, ob-
serve Jewish holidays at
home, and sometimes become
active in their temples. These
de facto Jews have become
numerous in some temples,
especially in smaller Jewish

communities. The CCAR's
1983 resolution on patrilineal
descent legitimized the
Jewishness of the children of
such intermarriages in which
the mother is not Jewish,
provided that the children
are raised as Jews.
The connection between the
refusal by rabbis to officiate
at interfaith weddings and
Reform Judaism's program of
Outreach to non-Jews is
widely misunderstood as a re-
jection of couples who intend
to intermarry and an ac-
ceptance of those who have
already done so. But Rabbi
Schindler does not find the
two strategies incongruous.
"Outreach is predicated on
the assumption that we can
oppose intermarriage without
rejecting the intermarried,"
he says. "The rabbi who does
not choose to officiate should
spend extra energy striving
to convince the couple that
there is no rejection involved.
I invariably spend far more
time counseling the couple to
whom I have to say 'no' than
with the couple whom I will
marry. If possible, I attend
their wedding to demonstrate
symbolically my embracing
them, even though I could
not myself officiate."
Intermarriage, which today
affects American Jewish
families, brings into conflict
two fundamental values —
full integration into Ameri-
can society and the preserva-
tion of Jewish distinctiveness.
Nothing dramatizes this con-
flict more sharply than the
interfaith wedding. In order
to bring more knowledge to
bear on this complex topic,
the newly-formed Research
Task Force for the Future of
Reform Judaism has begun a
five-year investigation into
every facet of Jewish inter-
marriage, including conver-
sion, unaffiliated mixed mar-
riages and rabbinic officiation
at interfaith weddings.

Poll Reveals
Anti-Semitism

Vienna (JTA) — A survey
conducted by Austria's four
major opinion poll institutes
showed that seven out of
every 100 Austrians are
self-declared anti-Semites.
The survey of a cross-section
of the population, totalling
9,000 people, sponsored by
the Austrian national bank,
showed that the lowest rate
of anti-Semitism — four per-
cent — was in the 14-29-year
age group and the highest
among those over 60.
Only three percent among
those with higher education
had anti-Semitic feelings,
while eight percent among
those with lower education
harbored the same feelings.
But the survey also showed

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