The New York Times has a new shingle out; it is championing conservatism in social pairings. Last week it was Stanley Fish warning that religious differences are “deep and immovable.” Today Naomi Schaefer Riley warns that young people are likely to intermarry at the “most secular points in their lives.” I.e., before they grow up and worry about getting a proper visa to heaven.
Her piece ends with the statement that as someone who is herself intermarried, she thinks intermarriage a good thing. But there is a lot of fingerwagging along the way:
My survey found that 48 percent of people who married before age 25 were in interfaith unions — compared with 58 percent of people who wed between ages 26 and 35, and 67 percent of people who married between ages 36 and 45. (These couples married in various decades, and some were not in their first marriage.)
Those who marry in their 30s and 40s, especially educated professionals, are often at the most secular points in their lives. These couples tended to underestimate how faith can grow in importance as they got older and had children.
Remarkably, less than half of the interfaith couples in my survey said they’d discussed, before marrying, what faith they planned to raise their kids in…
Religious leaders I interviewed — and not only Jewish ones — were broadly worried about interfaith marriage.
It seems to me utterly contradictory to lecture young people about their being at the most secular point in their lives when they decide to intermarry and failing to remark on the fact that as people get older they are more and more likely to intermarry. Maybe those older chance-takers have some valid basis for their choices.
These couples tended to underestimate how faith can grow in importance as they got older and had children.
LOL! If she means it would be wise to avoid a potential spouse who insists on performing rituals involving the surgical mutilation of the children’s genitals, then she may have a very valid point. In such cases, intermarriage between secular and religious Jews is probably inadvisable.
History of religion has a long story to tell about opposing intermarriage by religious leaders (Bible: Ezra/Nehemiah; Ruth). It is obvious that the opposition is born out of an interest to give strength to the own community. What religious leaders never took into account is the also obvious fact that intermarriage can bring to many people a more appropriate understanding of the “foreign” and also the “own” denomination or belief. The opposition of Jewish religious leaders against intermarriage was not different from views on this matter shared by Catholics and several Protestant denominations. The holocaust changed the set of arguments used (and misused) against intermarriage but not the strong convictions behind these negative attitude to it. The opposition against intermarriage is always grown out of a problematic idea of community building which is not really interested in the happiness of women, men, and children but in the favors of a special community.
oh those delusory secular years?
meanwhile, pie-in-the-sky?
reality?
RE: “Maybe those older chance-takers have some valid basis for their choices.”
Maybe, like how to raise the kids is no longer an issue? The kids are already near or already grown up?
Other interesting findings by Naomi SR:
1. Catholics in interfaith marriages were no more likely to divorce than those married to other Catholics. I wonder why, compared to the other types of interfaith families? Are Catholics more tolerant than those raised otherwise?
2. My research showed that marrying someone of another faith tended to improve one’s view of that faith.
So, by marrying someone of another religion, one actually learns to see past some lies one was reared with about those of another religion?
3. I am no impartial observer. I’m a Conservative Jew married to a former Jehovah’s Witness, who is African-American. (We are raising our children Jewish.)
So, she gets to have her cake and eat it too? What does raising your kids “Jewish” mean in the context of an intermarried family? Is this the hole card for Jews since a Jew can be a totally, or nearly so, secular Jew, even an atheist Jew, but you can’t be raised as a Christian child, for example, and not believe in JESUS THE SON OF GOD (And Heaven and Hell). Easter eggs, bunnies, and Xmas trees are not the same as learning about Jewish history as part of Jewish holiday celebrations, are they?
Also, is she raising her kids “black.” or “white”? Dunno as she doesn’t go there. Well, I guess her kids won’t have any inhibitions about getting a blood transfusion if they need it since they are not being raised as JWs.
‘Religious leaders I interviewed — and not only Jewish ones — were broadly worried about interfaith marriage.”
Of course they are….churches/faiths are always concerned about losing members and increasing members—- they are no different than corporations who want to keep or expand their customer base.
For Jews/ Judaism it’s a double whammy because their numbers are smaller to begin with
The message I get from uber zionist who write about this is it’s as much about maintaining the ‘peoplehood’ numbers for tribal power as it is about Judaism….for some I am sure religion doesn’t even really have anything to do with their intermarriage objections.
However I think it’s a losing battle…..unless some giant tidal wave of religiosity sweeps the nation or world and reverses the trend faith isn’t going to be the number one consideration in marriages…..other things about/between two people that they are simpatico on are more important anyway imo.