Judaism is more than ‘tikkun olam’ | JTA

At least a portion of my hometown of Omaha, Neb., may well be under water in the coming days. Pumps are in place at various locations, including at a nuclear power plant located not far from town. The Missouri River, which borders our city, has risen to potentially dangerous levels. Some Omaha residents have taken to sandbagging to help reinforce critical locations along the river.

This potential disaster mirrors the serious challenge facing the non-Orthodox Jewish world.
Non-Orthodox Judaism is confronted by rising levels of secularism that almost always lead to assimilation -- a trend that within a generation or two could render Reform and Conservative Judaism largely irrelevant in North America (and abroad as well). Non-Orthodox Jews’ general discontent with and resulting departure from Jewish life, left alone, stands to bring Reform and Conservative Judaism to a state of obsolescence.
This prediction is neither original nor new. From studies about very high interfaith marriage rates to growing assimilation percentages, we should know by now that the non-Orthodox way of life is failing by just about every metric we have at our disposal. (I am not Orthodox, by the way.) Some may not like reading these words and others may be angered by them, but like the flood facing Omaha, it’s hard to ignore what one sees. Read more »