Compared To What?

try was ... the Young Israel dance. I know from my par-
ents' generation, good shomer Shabbos families, husband
and wife now in their 80s, met at a Young Israel dance.
That doesn't happen anymore."
Rabbi Lamm says the future is likely to bring "a de-
mographic strengthening of the haredi [right-wing, non-
Zionist] group," many of whom have large families and
lead outreach efforts to the non-observant community.
What is modern? That depends where you live.
Chicago, Los Angeles and New York City used to be
`—,
/ home to strong modern communities. Los Angeles and
New York still have modem enclaves, but Chicago has
become more conservative.
Washington, D.C., has three modem synagogues with-
in about a 20-mile radius of one another, and thriving
modem Orthodox communities exist in Miami, Toronto
and Israel.
In Detroit, Young Israel synagogues, of which there
are three, are considered to be "modern"; in cities with
larger modem communities, Young Israel often is right
of modem.
H Cleveland and Baltimore led the veer to the right. "In
New York City, modern Orthodoxy, to the extent that it
persists, is in Manhattan, Riverdale. But in Brooklyn and
Queens," right is the way to go, and modem has become
centrist, Rabbi Greenberg says.
"In Chicago, modem was so strong that you had this
classic example called the traditional synagogue — Or-
thodox shuls without mechitzah [divider between men
and women in the synagogue]. Denver, other cities in the
West, too many of these synagogues disintegrated —
couldn't get rabbis or membership, or became Conserva-
tive," he says.
Some consider parts of the Orthodox communities of
Detroit, Baltimore and. New York as stuck in the 1950s
in terms of custom and interpretation.

[

Rabbi Ilan Feldman:
Open parking lot but no prayer for Israel.

Thirty years ago, mixed-sex dancing and swimming
were common among America's Orthodox. Today, many
Orthodox families still swim in mixed groups, but may
leave heavily observant enclaves to do so, Dr. Gurock
says.
It is difficult to find an Orthodox celebration today
where mixed dancing prevails. (The issue is touching.
Some say there is nothing halachically wrong with being
in the same pool, but men and women who touch during
dancing poses problems. A number of Orthodox women
wear baseball caps and long T-shirts, as coverups, for
mixed swimming.)
Janis Roszler, whose family davens at Young Israel-
Oak Park and whose children attend Altiva Hebrew Day
School, the city's only Orthodox Zionist school, says De-
troit leans more to the right than other communities in
which she has lived, including Skokie, Ill., and Pittsburgh.
Her definition of modern "is a balance between the sec-
ular world and the religious world. [Our family] wants to
have our values rooted in Torah-based Judaism, but we
would like to succeed in the secular world, as well. My
goals for my children are that they go on to universities
and even my daughters get professions, but remain very
true to Torah-based Judaism, to Orthodox Judaism."
Zionism is "absolutely central to our definition of who we
are."
One of the areas where Orthodox Jews differ is re-
garding the religious role of women.
In Detroit, that role is "still very traditional," Mrs. Ros-
zler says. "I have been in communities where the women
have carried the Torah, and according to many halachic
interpretations, that's permissible."
But it can take a while before what is permissible be-
comes practice. "I think the families would accept it, but
the community is very, very traditional and it's hard to
move that quickly," Mrs. Roszler says.