Upgrading God: Americans Big on Conversion

Both my parents were converts to Roman Catholicism when I was younger, so I spent nearly 10 years growing up as a Catholic. However interestingly enough, around 11 years old, my mind started to grow out of these tenants of religion. I didn't really know anything about my Jewish heritage on my mother's side until I was around 12, this only feeding to my fire of wanting a spiritual change. Being the only child, growing up with little to nothing at times also fed fire to this change I was seeking at such an early age. Around 16 years old, I had already left the Catholic church and was attending Conservative services at a local Hillel student center, and attending high holy days with a small-knit Chabad in town. At age 19, I joined the military, at age 21, while still on active duty, I had my Bar Mitzvah in an Orthodox community in Los Angeles, while attending services not too far from my apartment in San Diego at the San Diego State University Chabad.

Its very interesting to note how one seeks for such Spiritual change. The grass will always be green when it comes to perspectives on the Creator, people seek the vantage point that encapsulates their individuality. If anything you might want to say that this change is brought about by one's social environment, and that this directly affects views on various faiths.

While there has been a tendency in the Jewish media to focus on the positive - that as a group Jews are the most likely to be earning six figures and are well educated - I find little to rejoice here.  The survey clearly shows that Jews are the LEAST likely to have children.  In fact, 72% of Jews live in homes that have no children and the number rises to 82% if you are a Conservative Jew.

This does not bode well for Jewish continuity in the United States nor does it bode well for Jews politically if the percentage of Jews in the general population continues to decline.  Together with the findings regarding earnings it brings to mind either a religion made up of rich old people or rich young people not interested in having children.  In either case you have a lot of Jews living in big empty homes.

young Jewish couples in America should have about 6 kids each and that will help turn things around.lol

What this survey tells me is that the biggest predictor for Jewish affiliation is not, any longer, who your parents were or how you were raised. Jews could have the highest rate of births, but if all those kids leave Judaism, it doesn't mean much for the growth and strength of the Jewish community. By contrast, if Jews aren't having as many kids (something that, by the way, also tends to be correlated with high education and material comfort, although causation is more difficult to prove) but new people feel called to Judaism and become converts, then the Jewish community will stay healthy... provided that converts are welcomed as a genuine part of the community.

What this tells me is that focus needs to shift from "Have kids and raise them Jewish or else" to "Welcome converts or else" if we are to stay a vibrant living religious community. 

Are you sure about your figures?  I don't see very many childless Jewish couples at all.  I'm not counting the orthodox, just among conservative Jews.

And, Cav...yes, the state of Jewish education correlates negatively to income and education--just my sense of it.  That is, the more of the latter the poorer quality of the former. We may have nice incomes and degrees, but educationally, we're in the slums.  I suspect that if there were no curriculum on the Holocaust, intellectually and spiritually we'd be wandering the woods bumping into trees.  

Definitely the Diaspor...ow! 

"And Cav...yes, the state of Jewish education correlates negatively to income and education--just my sense of it"

That isn't what I said. If you're going to say "Are you sure about your figures?" to Seraph and make a generalization that you say is "just [your] sense of it," which I take to mean you're not willing to back up your assertion with any facts, you may want to rethink your strategy.

In all US communities (non-Jews as well as Jews) that I'm aware of, there is a correlation between higher education/income and lower birth rates. This probably has nothing to do with people with advanced degrees having inadequate yeshiva larnin', as we called it in the South. It probably has everything to do with 1) perceiving a logistical choice between raising a family vs. getting more secular education and hope for a better job, 2) having educational goals interrupted by unexpected children often is a permanent interruption, with resulting lower income, 3) delaying raising children until the advanced degree is completed often also becomes permanent, because the next big thing is finding reliable work, and then the demands of a career.

Now on the other hand if you want to advance the "better Jewish education : less secular schooling" argument, you might take a look at Jehovah's Witnesses for comparison; they actively discourage their kids from going to college because as soon as they are done with high school they are supposed to be doing missionary work, and they might be exposed to such infernal teachings as evolution and pluralism and tolerance at Satan University. Is a "good" yeshiva education one that is viewed as incompatible with college and graduate education? and if so, might that be part of the reason for the correlation between "good" yeshiva schooling and less secular education? Further, is a "good" yeshiva education one that hinders going to college for logistical reasons? I have no idea, having not had any Jewish education myself as my parents were secular and I am only coming to Judaism as an adult (full disclosure: with a MA degree). But it's a valid question. If you want good religious education and an advanced degree, let's say a MSW, what extra hoops do you have to jump through to get it?

I'm interested in knowing how many people are joining religions who were formerly unaffiliated, and which ones. It's not just a story of people's individual self-determination leading them away from the faiths of their childhood, but stories of individual self-determination leading them to choose some kind of religious practice. There is some movement to the reverse, even if it's not as much, and here I am as an example.

What I said was that Seraph's figures do not match the data I see every day.  That's all. His figures were astounding--72 to 82 percent of Jews not having children?  And that doesn't seem extreme to you?  Okay--and we might even live in the same southern city.  And since when is ending a sentence with a question mark an assertion.  I think it's a question.  That's why I used the question mark. 

What you implied is that Jewish kids born to Jews tend to leave the faith--because...if your hypothesis isn't that Jewish education is in shambles, then that's my mistake.  So how do you explain this mini-reverse-exodus.  Or if you accept Seraph's figures, this major-reverse-exodus?  

My theory is that Jewish education is terrible, creates no interest or understanding, no sense of self.  It's time better spent in front of the television, because the results are the same.  I am aware of the correlation between higher education and lower birthrates--but 82 percent (question mark)?

And why do you criticize me for drawing implications when you did it yourself (question mark)?  I did no such thing as to advance the 'less secular schooling' argument.  I don't even believe in it.  My kids go to secular schools--and I'm not thrilled with that either.  Have you ever looked through a second, third, or fourth grade math book (question mark)?  It's not the teachers, it's this slow curriculum (finally, a statement).

I sent my first child to a Day school, where they taught her to, essentially, hate Gd.  Come Bat Mitzvah time, I just asked her what her conception of Gd was.  A jaw-dropping answer.  

You spent two paragraphs responding to something I didn't even say.  I would suggest asking more questions to clarify before you respond.  But that's only a suggestion.       

www.allfaith.com/Religions/Judaism/hinterlands.html

Hope springs eternal I guess.lol

1) On question marks: The assertion that you said was "just your sense of it" was the following, directly quoted from your post for the second time: "yes, the state of Jewish education correlates negatively to income and education--just my sense of it." I found it inconsistent that you were objecting to Seraph's assertions (which I don't agree with either) with the incredulous-sounding "Are you sure about your figures?" and then immediately thereafter making an assertion (one without a question mark) that you excuse from providing any facts to back up at all. I see now that it's not inconsistent: you seem to be consistently prioritizing personal experience over facts and statistics, which is a perfectly valid position. Particularly in an instance when, as you say, the statistics aren't sourced and seem both off the cuff and incredible.

2) You misread me in my first post, I suppose. I said nothing about Jewish education. Jewish kids grow up to leave Judaism for the same reasons Christian kids grow up to leave Christianity, Buddhist kids grow up to leave Buddhism, and atheist kids grow up to join a religion: What worked for their parents isn't working for them, and the emphasis, society-wide, is on finding something new rather than making do with what you've got when something isn't working.

3) I'm not criticizing you for drawing implications, nor did I think you were arguing for less secular schooling. I believed, on the grounds of your post, that you were advancing the argument that there was a correlation between less secular schooling and better religious schooling, or vice versa.  You said:

"the state of Jewish education correlates negatively to income and
education--just my sense of it.  That is, the more of the latter the
poorer quality of the former."

I understood this to mean: more secular education means less religious education. 

"We may have nice incomes and degrees, but educationally, we're in the slums."

Based on my reading of the preceding quotes, I understood this to mean that while we have sufficient secular education to get us nice jobs, our religious education is in a sad state.

This interpretation, I felt, was supported by:

"I suspect that if there were no curriculum on the Holocaust,
intellectually and spiritually (italics mine) we'd be wandering the woods bumping into
trees."

We seem to chronically misread each other, and it's not something I want to drag other Jewcers through on a regular basis. Moreover, there's no major disagreements between us that should make it this hard for us to communicate. I certainly don't want you to feel that I'm attacking you every time I question something you write or try to explore another facet of it (as I did with the third and fourth paragraph of my second post). Nor do I want you to feel compelled to resort to such digs as writing "(question mark)" before every "?". Let's work something out so we don't go around like this anymore. And let's take that either to PMs or to my user blog so as not to clog up this thread anymore. (PMs are fine with me or if you want the conversation to be public, let me know and I'll start a thread in my user blog to discuss this in the comments.)

So if you copy and paste your above response into a PM, I will then respond, beginning with my correlating personal experience with more scientifically syntaxed facts, not  prioritizing.  We all do it.

Looking forward to your PM.  Although, if we are misunderstanding each other consistently, I honestly don't know a solution other than really asking questions of each other to clarify our meanings.

Your comment:

I have no idea, having not had any Jewish education myself as my
parents were secular and I am only coming to Judaism as an adult (full
disclosure: with a MA degree). But it's a valid question. If you want
good religious education and an advanced degree, let's say a MSW, what
extra hoops do you have to jump through to get it?

In regards to a Jewish education I am not sure if you were placing your thoughts on the matter of receiving an advanced degree with a religious education, or if someway this interpretation is something you have learned or read.

What I will tell you is that based on by upbringing [see my post above] - I was so dirt poor that any type of Yeshiva was out of the question. But I will say that I made it work for me I joined the military for almost 6 years, got military educational benefits, and TA outside of anything that my parents could have done, and it turns out I will be getting a great Jewish education very soon through Yeshiva University. I didn't have to jump through any hoops to get mine, only lots of hard work getting my Associates while deployed, then my Bachelor's and now an MSW program through Yeshiva. My mother still lives a rural hippie lifestyle, and is still a Christian to this very day, however there still remains mutual respect on both ends for our spiritual paths; only one of many reasons that I love my mother.

Ultimately this self-determination that you speak of does play a vital role in people making happy lives for themselves. Anyone can do it, and as far as hoops are concerned, if anything I can be an example of a person that has been through almost everyone of them. Self-determination = motivation, and motivation = the ambition to only want more for yourself, and to create your life of individuality that will ultimately make you happy with who you are, and the person that you will represent.

To Cavanaugh:

 I agree with you that the major finding of the survey shows that many people change their religions and that Judaism is gaining members as well as losing them.  Unfortunately, the report shows that an increasing number of Jews are leaving Judaism, so I am not sure that we can count on conversion to assure either Jewish continuity or Jewish political relevance in the United States.

Based on the study, Judaism has only a 70% retention rate.  While this is higher than Protestants, it is lower than Hindus, who have a retention rate of 84%.  This may be because Hindus are often first and second generation immigrants, but I think that we should do better than getting a C on this report card.  The report shows a Gain of .3% to Judaism and a Loss of .5% from Judaism, so we are losing members overall. 

I agree that increased wealth and education correlates with fewer children.  All I am saying is that: 1) It doesn't have to be that way; 2) I personally find it sad to think of all those people in big, empty homes. 3) You can not argue with my contention that Jews as a percentage of the overall population is in decline and that this will necessarily have political repercussions.

 I agree that we should warmly embrace converts and even make it easier for people to become "Jews by Choice". 

Naftali:

The figures regarding childlesness are from the actual report. 

According to the study (which has been criticized for having a sample size of 682 people) the percentage of Conservative Jews with NO Children is 82%.  To put that into perspective, the percentage of Mormons with No Children is 51% and for Muslims that is 53%.

Perhaps the reason the numbers seem excessively high to you is because it is based on the total Jewish population in the survey (i.e. the aforementioned 682 Jews).  Many of those people interviewed might be young, divorced, or elderly and hence have no children at home.  In the case of Conservative Jews, I suspect that it has something to do with the fact that this is an aging population.

Makes sense on a first read. If there's an overall bias in response toward educated people who are either young or old but not of middle age (i.e. people who have time to take a survey!) in the survey as a whole, it would have a higher impact on groups with a smaller sample size within the survey, so the caveat at the end of your post is well-made.

I think those numbers need to be cross referenced with the overall Jewish population.  Given the survey, Jews should be in a steep demographic decline.  I believe I've read statements that we are pretty steady in terms of raw numbers.  Maybe a difference of between one and five percent either way. 

We tend to hover around 12 million--and it's been that way for some time. 

Incidentally, while I think it is true that the general trend is Higher Education + Higher Income = Fewer Children, it is interesting to note that the survey shows that this is not necessarily so.

Hindus interviewed for this study were more educated on average than Jews (48% post graduate vs 35% for Jews) and second only to Jews in income (46% of jews making $100,000 or more vs 43% for Hindus) yet on average only 52% of Hindus lived in homes with no children (vs. the 72% for Jews).

While this may be cultural - i.e. it may have to do with a tendency to live in joint families rather than independently - it is still something to consider.

If your numbers are accurate, then in 15 to twenty years, virtually all synagogues will be orthodox. 

It also means the somehow the universities were able to uninstall the procreative impulse.  That doesn't sound very smart, just in case you didn't get your daily dose of irony.   

In terms of Judaism does this survey in fact represent the numbers of people that are of Jewish heritage, but do not practice, or religiously 'unidentified' Jews - those who are unaware of their religious heritage, or lost through time? Surely we could count all these numbers about Jews that have converted based on their environment and socio-economical premise. However, I believe there are many more 'types' of groups in this survey that are in fact still left unrepresented. 

Means that Jews can afford to have larger families then.:-)

I spoke to my Rabbi a while back on who he felt was the most type of people(ex-religion) that converted to Judaism and also what is the most he saw as being involved in a relationship with a Jew but came from a different background. His answer on both was Catholic and that confirmed my feelings as thats what I was seeing and I wanted to know if he noticed the same. Further we spoke as to why and we both agreed on his thought of leaving one orthodoxy for another or being that a person with an orthodox background can most relate to a person of another orthodox background even if it was a different religion. Quite interesting.