Re: The cost of Jewish communal responsibility

[Marvin Margoshes <physchem...>]

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: glenn tamir 
  To: World music from a Jewish slant 
  Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2003 12:33 AM
  Subject: Re: The cost of Jewish communal responsibility


  I totally empathize with Jeremy - and if he thinks it's bad now, wait until 
he's got a few kids (only two or three because the cost of a day school 
education is out of control) And of course, the non-orthodox knee-jerk liberal 
jewish Community won't organize behind vouchers.

  Is it "knee jerk" to learn from history?  I know from my parents' generation 
the place of free public schools in bringing immigrants into the general 
population, and helping them to thrive.  I know from my nine years on a school 
board the damage that vouchers will do to public schools.  Religion-based 
schools, and other non-public schools, have the luxury of not dealing with the 
hard to educate. They just expel them, and the public schools must deal with 
them, at great expense.

  Do you know that my shul (shall remain nameless but I'm sure it's quite 
typical) already billed me for my daughter's Bat-Mitzvah which happens to be in 
April 2005!!

  I don't know your shul, but mine has seen more than a few cases of parents 
who left wiithout paying as soon as the bnei mitzvah was over.  Should the shul 
wait untl the week before to ask for payment?  Should it just accept free 
loaders?  The Board of my shul doesn't want to send a bill collector after the 
parents because they think it will send the wrong message.  The parents have 
already sent the wrong mressage to the child by their actions.

  Sorry for the kvetching but it's gotten a bit too much and it just feels good 
to emote.


  Sam Weiss <SamWeiss (at) bellatlantic(dot)net> wrote:
    At 05:42 PM 9/9/03, Jeremy A Schiffer wrote:
    >Organized Judaism, in many places, seems entirely preoccupied
    >with extracting large sums of money from people.

    While I empathize with your plight, since I earn my livelihood from 
    Organized Judaism it behooves me to address this oft-heard complaint in a 
    general way, without meaning to cast any aspersions on Mr. Schiffer .

    >Now, I'm living in New York, and with my girlfriend, attempting to find a
    >place where we can worship this year and hopefully beyond.

    If more of the people who eventually decide to partake of Organized Judaism 
    in their middle-adult years instead made it a habit to affiliate and 
    support their Jewish community on a more consistent basis, the economics of 
    affiliation would be vastly different.

    >Are working people, the middle class, not considere d 'holy' or
    >'Jewish' because we're not willing to take on the financial burden
    >necessary to join the religious 'mainstream'?

    No one is evaluating anyone's holiness in such a situation, but the term 
    "freeloader" is very often -- though certainly not always -- appropriate.

    >Is it wrong for us to believe that the organized Jewish community should 
    >be opening its arms to people wishing to join, rather than first handing 
    >people an itemized bill as a precondition to entry?

    It is the rare synagogue that does not make accommodations for financial 
    hardship situations when those wishing to join present their case 
    appropriately. But it is also the rare synagogue administration 
    irresponsible enough to make believe that an institution's budget can be 
    balance on good will alone. If one honestly feels that he cannot afford 
    something which he wants and values, there should be no shame attached to 
    asking for financial le niency in an honest and forthright way, instead of 
    wishing -- as in a fairy tale -- that things could be free, that synagogue 
    utilities and salaries and facility maintenance and capital improvements 
    and communal charity needs etc. etc. would be magically paid for 
    by..... By whom? By the local Catholic diocese?

    >I have never heard of a Christian church turning away worshippers, even on
    >Christmas or Easter

    Because responsible community-minded Christians -- even those who only 
    attend services on Christmas -- know the value of supporting THEIR church, 
    THEIR pastor, THEIR soup kitchen =all year round, and all of their 
    life=. This is a fact of life which many otherwise culturally savvy Jews 
    have trouble understanding. And because of this vast support, Christian 
    denominations can pool the resources of their "franchises" and have the 
    money to support local churches in economically deprived locations, whereas 
    among synagogu es it's href="http://www.klezska.com";>www.klezska.com


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