A controversy has broken out within Conservative Judaism as two prominent rabbis have openly rejected the movement’s stance against intermarriage. David Wolpe weighs in:
Among the many arguments on both sides, there is an underlying reality: America is very uncomfortable with particularism. Borders, boundaries, and exclusions make us uneasy. Standards smack of elitism. Saying to someone, “you may not join,” goes against our American ethos.
In the American story, love erases all boundaries. Think of the Disney movies: beauty marries the beast, the mermaid marries the man. The people who stand on the sidelines in such stories and say, “you cannot marry each other, you are from different worlds,” are either clueless or evil. How many American movies, shows, and books tell the story of the outsider who is finally accepted? . . . Today, the fight over immigration takes on this question: what are our rights of exclusion and what are the norms of inclusion?
For Jews, this is a very powerful question. Unlike Christianity, which is a belief-based system (believe in Jesus and you are Christian), Judaism is familial. You are born Jewish. Like any family, you can join (through conversion), but you are expected to “feel” like family. You are implicated in the fate of all Jews. . . .
Yet we know what happens when there are no borders at all. Without boundaries there is no nation, without standards there is no institution, without periodic rejection acceptance means nothing. So on one side religion risks being seen as narrow and exclusionary, and on the other side is the possibility of losing all self-definition.
Read more on RealClearReligion: http://www.realclearreligion.org/articles/2017/06/21/the_perils_of_particularism_110155.html