A question came up in a Jewish email group that I am a part of about how to explore opening synagogues and synagogue life to those who don’t have spouses or children, given that over half of American adults now are single. What an interesting question! And invitation for Jewish innovation and a living, Jewish experience!
The discussion began with the question focused on how to welcome unmarried women and women without children, though I don’t believe this “problem” impacts unmarried women or women without children alone, but also unmarried men, men without children, and parents without primary physical custody of their children.
Regrettably, synagogues are not often welcoming or ideal places for individuals who are unmarried or without children. And perhaps these concerns are not unique to the Jewish community or the greater religious world at large?
I found these questions and the ensuing conversation in the group very intriguing. Many ideas come to mind, though I can only speak from my own experience in the Jewish world and in other communities.
As an adult, I have largely stepped away from formal synagogue life, though I was quite active teaching Religious School within the Reform Jewish movement several years ago while in college and graduate school and have made many attempts to enter into synagogues, synagogue life, and other religious communities since then.
I have thought a lot about the place of synagogue in contemporary Jewish life (and even recently posted a blog about this: “Dog” Jews and “Cat” Jews: Contemporary Judaism, the Synagogue, and Jewish Innovation). Despite my training now to serve as a Rabbi, I am keenly aware that there are Rabbis and Cantors serving in synagogues and other Jewish institutions who may read this blog post – in addition to other clergy, including Catholic and Buddhist priests and Christian ministers – and am a bit hesitant to share some of my ideas out of deep respect for their great work.
My thought is that there are more and larger issues with the contemporary institution of the synagogue and other contemporary Jewish institutions than only underserving singles and Jews without children, though this is huge. My experience as someone who is very much a seeker and someone who has been around the “block” a time or two is that, quite unfortunately, the synagogue as an institution and much of contemporary Jewish life has lost its mission.
My feeling has long been that the synagogue and other formal Jewish institutions has regrettably lost an interest in and connection with God, coinciding with a drop in membership and regular attendance. This is something probably not unique to Jews, as this is also something of a struggle for much of Northern Hemispheric Catholicism and the progressive, mainline Protestant world, as well.
As a Jewish people, we are generally safe in the United States, deeply value educational attainments, and are financially well off. With this, and our general adherence to the Modern and even Post-Modern worlds, God – or faith in something meaningful and larger than our personal egos – has been dying a slow and penetrating death.
These trends, I believe, have really thrown the synagogue and other formal Jewish institutions into a bit of a tailspin. Is the synagogue a house of worship – to a God few have a connection with or relate to, no less – a social club, or what may may feel like a museum? Personally, I believe and hope that there is still a place for synagogues or someplace like a synagogue where spiritual needs can be met, yet I am cautiously optimistic.
Here, I am particularly saddened and heartbroken to read in my email group’s discussion and elsewhere Rabbis and other Jewish leaders speak about their pessimism of the synagogue’s ability or willingness to successfully reach the Jewish community and their own lack of interest in making the institution of the synagogue their project. Though I do understand!
It is interesting – and a bit ironic – that Zen centers, Buddhist sanghas, and especially secular mindfulness groups are filled with people, especially individual people attending without a single family member in tow. For years!
Similarly, I believe it an important pursuit and pragmatic beginning to explore the area of small group ministry that is taking hold of many Protestant – often Evangelical – churches for ideas and inspiration for how to address the particular needs of single Jews or Jews without children within the synagogue.
This really is a larger issue, and there are many wonderful ideas floating around within the Christian tradition for how to address these similar demographic and systemic issues within these church communities. I found the foundations and rationale for small group ministry really interesting and helpful and in some ways more penetrating than the related Jewish idea and innovation of a Chavurah.
When I was teaching Religious School, it often felt that I was working in what I can only – and regrettably – call a Bar/Bat Mitzvah “factory.” It absolutely pains me to say this!! What are we teaching our young children?! What really is the value and mission of Judaism and our deep and great faith?! I’ve heard many parents and colleague teachers say, “Just get it over with, and you can go back to your ‘regular life’”!
To the greater question, my impression is that Jewish innovation requires we make Judaism less of a spectacle or performance and more a participatory “sport.” If the mission of the synagogue is reduced to “churn” out Jewish kids who can perform well the day of their Bar/Bat Mitzvah, we will not only lose these kids, we will lose singles, adults, those with children and those without, and everyone in between!
These issues are also coupled and complicated very much with the large elephant in the room. Mind you, I am a huge animal person, really like elephants, respect their grandeur, fantasize about going on African safaris, and have no grudge against this or other elephants! 😊
I’ve read statistics that the Jewish community has a ~50% intermarriage rate and that ~80% of children in the non-Orthodox Jewish community are born to interfaith couples. Synagogues and other formal Jewish institutions are just simply ill prepared for this given reality and unable to meet the religious and spiritual needs of this time. And to be honest and fair, I am not all too sure what this would or can look like.
It is not just the synagogue, but I believe that we all – and each one of us – must find our Jewish or spiritual mission. It may sound strange to say, though God is way larger than Jewish and interfaith and vastly beyond Jew or Christian, single or married, with child or without children.
The endless search for meaning and connection is beyond names like God, Dharmakaya, the Absolute, Christ, Allah, Krishna, the Divine, YHVH, Ground of Being! It is exactly and necessarily this for peoples across the globe and yet beyond them all! We all need God or something we can call by a personal Name greater than ourselves! In meditation, we strive to know a living name that we can voice and realize for ourselves!
While my thoughts and feelings in this blog post may be strong, please know that I offer these words with great respect to the great work that so many in the Jewish and other religious communities are doing. Perhaps, I am reminding, enthusing, and encouraging myself most of all!?
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Adam Fogel
www.mindfuljudaism.com