Johnny and Pete Ginopolis and the employees of OA Ss Ogg 27815 Middlebelt at 12 Mile • Farmington Hills 851-8222 Diaspora Jewry: Is It Dying? GIL FREUND SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS Heartily Wish Their Customers, Friends And The. Entire Community A A VERY HEALTHY AND HAPPY NEW YEAR Ra.,_ 116 FamilyResturant Iforn.. Farmington Hills Wishes It's Customers & Friends A Very Healthy And Happy New Year YOU'RE LOOKING ATA LETHAL WE N. Agelo g- Covue 28990 Orchard Lake Rd. 855-8882 ti • As% %link Liik %.‘ %Immo tOok Iss:24 4°P4tmer s tie ts Ara May the New Year Bring To All Our Friends and Family Health, Joy, Prosperity and Everything Good in Life FUNG LIM'S RESTAURANT, INC. 8410 W. NINE MILE RD. OAK PARK 544-1021 Fact is, more Americans may die by the fork than by any other weapon. That's because so many of them use it irresponsibly. Like to fill up on high-fat, high- cholesterol foods. Foods that can load the blood with cholesterol, which can build up plaque in their arteries, increasing their risk of heart attacks and threaten- ing their lives. So next time you pick up a fork, remem- ber to handle it as you would any other weapon. For self-defense, not self-destruction. American Heart Association WE'RE FIGHTING FOR YOUR LIFE This space provided as a public service. s we approach the end o f E the millennium, we can look back on an honorable parade of Jewish demog- raphy and identity surveys. The present debate was kindled with the publication in the United States of the 1990 National Jew- ish Population Survey of the Council of Jewish Federations. Though each survey has its Canadians experience a Roman feast. critics and most surveyors admit hefty margins of error, the trends thousands of young, unaffiliated are, nevertheless, implacable and Jewish souls issues a silent chal- inescapable. lenge to the Jewish establish- By the end of the century, ment. America's Jewish population, Israel, by contrast, though be- now estimated at 5.5 million, is leaguered by security problems conservatively expected to de- and the absorption of immi- crease by a half-million. This is grants, is not plagued by these despite the influx of immigrants same demography and identity and additions through intermar- devils. There are now 4.34 mil- riage. lion Jews in Israel, out of a total It was estimated at the Inter- population of 5.3 million. Some national Conference on Jewish half a million immigrants have Community Services, held in arrived since 1989 and the pop- Jerusalem, that by the beginning ulation is increasing steadily. By of the next century there will be the beginning of the next centu- 2 million fewer Jews in the world. ry, the majority of world Jewry Within a hundred years, no more will undoubtedly be concentrat- than a million Jewish souls are ed in Israel, the first time in mod- expected to remain in America. ern history this will have been Similarly, by the year 2,000 true. there will be only 150,000 Jews What is more, according to the left in the former Soviet Union Guttman Institute of Applied So- with two Jewish parents. Com- cial Research, 79 percent of Is- bine that with an estimated 50 rael's Jewish citizens describe percent intermarriage rate for themselves as somewhat, great- American Jews (70 percent for ly or strictly observant (41 per- some European countries), and cent, 24 percent and 14 percent it is clear why alarm bells are respectively). This has exploded ringing all over the Jewish world. The explanations proposed for these harrowing statistics are varied and interconnected. The current average number of chil- dren per Jewish woman in the United States is now a low 1.6 and is ascribed to, among other sociological and economic factors, the prohibitively high cost of rais- ing and educating a Jewish child. the myth of a largely secular Is- Sociologist Uzi Rebhun of the raeli society (only 21 percent call Hebrew University's Harman In- themselves totally non-observant) stitute of Contemporary Jewry, and led the surveyors to conclude: sees this low fertility rate as more "Israeli Jews are strongly com- statistically important than in- mitted to the continuing Jewish termarriage in the waning U.S. character of their society, even population (he says a minimum while they are selective in their of 2.1 children per woman is nec- observance." essary to maintain the current Critics of the Gutl airan report population). have complained that what the But intermarriage does seem surveyors call religious obser- to take a heavy toll on how Jews vance is, in many cases, simply identify themselves and their folk or social custom. In other children. According to Mr. Reb- words, a family that lights can- hun, only a quarter of the chil- dles and sits down regularly to a dren of mixed marriages consider traditional Friday night meal their parents Jews. might be doing so for other than But this is hardly an either/or strictly religious reasons. proposition. Intermarriage has a But if the same statistics, proven negative effect on Jewish whatever their form or origin, identity, but the reality of thou- LU The low fertility rate is statistically more important than intermarriage.