Canuck Rabbis Saddened by Gay Rights at the JTS
Judaism, Jewish culture, Jewish Community, Jewish News, Conservative April 4th, 2007Oh, well so much for Canadian claims of tolerance towards the GLBT population.
I must admit I was really surprised to read this…
Canadian rabbis expressed sadness after last week’s announcement by the Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS) – the Conservative movement’s flagship institution in New York – that it will accept openly gay and lesbian students to its rabbinical and cantorial schools.
“I feel that this is an abandonment of traditional Judaism, and as such I can have no part of it,” said Rabbi Wayne Allen, spiritual leader of Toronto’s Beth Tikvah Synagogue and president of the Rabbinical Assembly’s Ontario region, the movement’s rabbinic organization.
The move “calls into question what it is that the Conservative movement really stands for and how it defines itself and in what significant way is the movement ideologically different from our Reform colleagues,” said Rabbi Steven Saltzman, spiritual leader of Adath Israel Congregation.
“It seems we have abandoned an important niche which used to act as the bridge between Orthodox and Reform. With Reform moving to the right and Orthodoxy moving to the right, our moving to the left seems to leave a huge gap, a chasm.”
You can read the rest here!
Technorati tags: Jewish Theological Seminary, Gay Rights, Judaism, Conservative Judaism, Canadian Rabbis
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April 5th, 2007 at 1:03 pm
I love the new background!
April 5th, 2007 at 1:25 pm
I’m glad that you liked the new background but what about the sad rabbis?
April 5th, 2007 at 4:26 pm
What I think? My thoughts are very random. It amazes me how rabbis within the same movement can have such a vast difference of opinions. I find it equally odd that one of the rabbis interviewed for the article easily differentiates how he feels in regards to women being rabbis as not breaking from tradition but that a gay man would be. I would guess that most traditionalists would say both are equal. Although I’m just guessing here.
I strongly agree with this statement about pluralism: “means that we recognize more than one way to be a good Conservative Jew, more than one way of walking authentically in the path of our tradition and of carrying that tradition forward.” That statement pretty much says that regardless of one’s personal opinions, we must see outside and beyond tradition in order to respect other’s. It makes sense to me. It shows tolerance and acceptance.
I think the other thing that sat odd with me after reading the article was the statement that the rabbi shared saying that he felt that this particular issue is what clearly defined the differences between Conservative Judaism and Reform Judaism. To me that’s such an odd thing; the notion of sexuality being the one thing that defines their biggest differences.