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Jewish World Review Oct. 8, 2008 / 9 Tishrei 5769 Many nonobservant Jews are finding religion By Ana Veciana-Suarez
Phyllis Levy grew up in a secular home and never learned the prayers of her ancestors. But when their only son was born, she and her husband, Phil, decided "we wanted to raise him in a way that he would understand what it was like to be Jewish."
When Mitch Joseph was a child, his family displayed a Hanukkah bush and went caroling with friends at Christmas. But after years of studying Torah, he now keeps a kosher home, sends his children to Jewish day school and will walk, not drive, to his Plantation, Fla., for High Holy Day services.
During the 10-day period bookmarked by Rosh Hashana, the Jewish new year, which began Monday at sundown, and Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, which begins tonight at sundown, many Jews will observe the High Holy Days in more traditional ways than their parents ever did. It's a trend, some say, that highlights a growing hunger for spiritual guidance, especially among the young.
"Before, when I used to go (to synagogue) for Rosh Hashana or Yom Kippur, I thought of it as my one time to be Jewish and after that I was done for the year," recalls de la Vera, 22. "It was an obligation, but now it has a very special meaning for me. I feel excited, I feel renewed. This is exactly where I want to be, with G-d and with the Jewish people."
No one is quite sure how extensive this trend toward religiosity is. Quantifying it is difficult because levels of observance vary widely even within denominations.
Yitzchak Rosenbaum, a spokesman for the National Jewish Outreach Program, says America's "warm, welcoming society" translated into assimilation and intermarriage for many Jews who emigrated here in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
"We know that definitely there has been a trend, but how do you define it?" Rosenbaum says. "Are they doing one thing or two things, or are they totally religious and observant?"
Most experts do agree on one thing: The movement toward orthodoxy is pronounced among the young. Citing a study from the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Nathan Katz, a professor of religious studies at Florida International University, says the Orthodox community is growing at a faster clip than demographic studies show — in large part because of a high birth rate.
Decades ago, the Orthodox were known for having the highest proportion of elderly among Jews. In 2001, they had the highest proportion of children — 39 percent, twice as high as the two other denominations.
Many rabbis cite religiosity among the young as a reason whole families become more observant. Elena Amsili is a teacher at the school at Temple Sinai, a reform synagogue in North Dade, Fla., but when her son, Jonathan, was preparing for his bar mitzvah, a rite of passage that welcomes Jewish boys into manhood at 13, he gravitated toward an Orthodox synagogue.
WHY THEY DO IT
The family's religious habits changed to accommodate him, including keeping kosher, lighting Sabbath candles and attending more services at the synagogue.
"Friends ask, 'How did this happen — you a teacher at a reform temple?'" Amsili says with a chuckle. "But I'm happy for him. I would rather he become more religious than have him go the other way."
De la Vera is considered a Baal Teshuva, a formerly secular Jew who has become stricter in his observance.
"I'm making more of a connection to G-d but also to the rest of the Jewish people," says the UM student, whose father is Christian and mother is a nonpracticing Jew. "Now I understand the stories my grandmother used to tell me about Jacob and Abraham and David. I can put things in context."
Other young people, like Amy Benjamin, 30, grow up fairly observant, rebel for a while, then come back. The South Beach therapist says she was "turned off" when her mom joined an Orthodox synagogue.
"I was 14 and overnight we had to make all these changes," she recalls. "There was a lot of resentment and I think part of it was that we didn't understand. There was no meaning behind what we did and it was just forced down our throats."
But after living for almost two years in Israel and attending Torah study classes with her mother, Benjamin felt "this deeper connection to a spirituality inside of me that I didn't know how to access before." She now considers herself "conserva-dox."
The increased observance, she says, has changed her life.
"It has given me a serenity and peace of mind I was trying to find in other venues."
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© 2008, The Miami Herald. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services
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