Hijacked by the demanding, spoiled Bar Mitzvah families

1.

My latest article in the Changing Face of Judaism series is here, dealing with the Reform movement and its intention to revitalize the Shabbat morning prayer. Here are a couple of paragraphs:

As Yoffie tries to rehabilitate Saturday morning services, another sacred cow that he needs to slaughter is standing in his way: the Bar Mitzvah ceremony. This is the reason why many members of Reform congregations are uncomfortable worshiping at the main service. What is left of that service, in a considerable portion of the temples, is a ritual that has become a monster, scaring away worshipers away from the horror show of the cult of Bar Mitzvah boys and girls.

Saturday mornings have been hijacked by the celebrating, demanding, spoiled families that expect full and exclusive attention to themselves. Yoffie was relatively polite when he talked about this. "How painful it is," he said, "to sit in a service where the child is the star and the theme is 'Steven Schwartz, king for a day,' or 'Sarah Goldstein, queen for a day.' Inevitably, this leads to speeches in which every boy or girl is smarter than Einstein, a better soccer player than Mia Hamm, more of a computer whiz than Bill Gates, and more of an activist than Bono." When he spoke about the bar-mitzvah issue, there were those in the hall who said "amen." The time has apparently come to set this matter straight.

A more positive take on Bar Mitzvahs can be found in the dialogue I had with Mark Oppenheimer, author of "Thirteen and a Day: The Bar and Bat Mitzvah Across America".

2.

This blog is for those seeking to read more material about recent developments in the Reform movement. A couple of weeks ago I wrote a story about the new Reform prayer book, Mishkan Tfilah. The last paragraph of the interview with the editor of this book, Rabbi Elyse Frishman, says this:

"This is a movement of its members and offers structural evidence to support this view: For the Orthodox, the rabbis are those who make the decisions, whereas for the Conservatives, the rabbinical seminaries are the most influential. For the Reform movement it is the headquarters - an organizational, rather than a 'rabbinical,' 'legal' or 'educational' body. What is the organization if not the representative of hundreds of thousands of members? What is the prayer book if not 'their book?' They will do with it as they choose."

3.

In the URJ web site you can find the new Shabbat site and the new Shabbat blog. You can also find Rabbi Yoffie's speech in full. I wrote a short article last week, dealing with the part of that speech that had to do with Israel , which I found extremely courageous. If you are interested in the relations between the Reform movement and Israel you can also read this dialogue with Rabbi Andrew Davids.

4.

Some American Jewish publications had interesting stories this week about the Reform biennial. The one I would read first, is from JTA and deals with Reform congregants who want to restore some gender separation in the movement. I don't think this has any real significance, but it is bizarrely interesting. And provocative. And maybe indicative of the many ways in which Reform Jews have become more traditional. Gary Rosenblatt of the NY Jewish Week writes that, "These are significant and heartening trends at a time when polls find that fewer Jews - particularly young people - are interested in affiliating with synagogues and Jewish organizations".

The Jewish Week also has a story about the new "The Torah: A Women?s Commentary", also from the Reform movement. Rabbi Hara Person discussed this new Torah commentary book in a dialogue here.

5.

The biennial in San Diego was my second, as I also attended the biennial in Houston two years ago. As I was thinking about Yoffie's chances to give the Shabbat morning prayer a boost, I went back to read his Houston address and the things I wrote about it:

The most revealing sentence I find in the speech is a more general statement one can read as a key to the Yoffie state of mind these days: "The problem for our synagogues may be," says Yoffie, "that we are not very good at saying 'no' in Reform Judaism ... In the realm of personal behavior, we are reluctant to ever use the word 'forbidden'." This, he believes, should be changed somewhat. A more restrictive movement, more demanding, more - should I dare say - conservative movement, is the one Rabbi Yoffie envisions. If you were a politician, I tell him, one would apply to you the overly employed phrase "mugged by reality." The do-whatever-you-want approach just doesn't work for a movement that needs members to be committed. So you basically ask the congregation to do more: study more, go to Israel more, practice more. Yoffie smiles again.