Is same-sex marriage a civil right?

Cross-posted on DovBear

On Tuesday, voters in Maine struck down a law that had been passed by the legislature allowing gay marriage. In an off-year election such as this, the ones coming out to vote were the conservative “values voters” whose opposition to gay marriage drove them to the polls in modest, but large enough, numbers to overturn the gay marriage law.

Voters have now voted to maintain the legal definition of marriage as between a man and a woman in over 30 states now. But these are undoubtedly only temporary setbacks for gay marriage rights activists. The youth of this country overwhelmingly support the right to same-sex marriage. They essentially feel “what’s the big deal?” As older voters disappear from the voting pool and younger voters enter it, gay marriage will eventually become protected in all 50 states, either by court action and insufficient opposition to change that legislatively, or in the legislature, or through ballot initiatives in the first place. But it may take a couple of decades before we get to that point.

As you can guess from the tone of this post so far, I support same-sex marriage rights. But some 16 months ago, I wrote a post supporting civil unions for everyone, and doing away with official government sanction of marriage entirely as a violation of the church-state divide.

I still believe that as an ideal. But in the real world, the institution of marriage as registered by the state isn’t going to disappear anytime soon. American society isn’t going to let go of state recognized marriage for a long, long time. So insisting only on the route of civil unions for everyone is a nonstarter and will deny rights to same-sex couples for years to come. For the meantime, however, there can certainly be a concept of civil marriage that is entirely divorced (if you’ll pardon the term) from church sanctioned marriage. Civil, secular marriage has a long history in this country, going back to the Puritans. “For them, marriage was a civil union, a contract, not a sacred rite.” (Mark A. Peterson: “Civil Unions in the City on a Hill“)

As a practicing Jew, I don’t demand that the government recognize the rules of my religion as state law, for example having shabbat on Saturday, so why should I, or any person of any faith, have a veto over who can get married?

That certainly doesn’t preclude any private religious group from maintaining that a marriage is between a man and a woman and restricting membership in their own group to those who believe and practice the same. But they shouldn’t be allowed to make that definition the civil definition of marriage as well and impose their will on a secular society.

Comment over on DovBear

Can you vote in a church?

I just did, yesterday. As far as I'm concerned, it's not an issue. I was going there to vote, not to worship. Plus, I don't think a contemporary Lutheran church is idolatrous.

Not that I have any problem going into any sort of church for any reason other than my own worhiping. I went into Notre Dame in Paris. I went into a Catholic church for a friend's funeral.

But what of those frummer souls who feel it's forbidden to enter a church? Do they feel they have to ask a Rav? What if this is their only valid opportunity to vote?

Have any readers come across this problem? How did you resolve it? What did your posek say?

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Yated Ne’eman favor

While in a frum store yesterday in New Jersey, I happened to glance at the Yated Ne’eman for sale and noticed that they had an article about the secrecy of negotiations on the health care bill. I decided to write a blog post about it and figured that I’d find the article online.

Well, it turns out that Yated doesn’t have a website. And I don’t live in the kind of community where Yated is sold. So if anyone would like to do me the favor of scanning that article in and emailing it to me (toratezra at gmail dot com) you will have my thanks and hopefully an insightful article on why the Yated advocates against legislation that would only help their community. The article was on the front page, left land column.

Thanks!

Frum Jews and RV’s

RV's don't usually conjure up images of frum Jews, but an enterprising business has found a way to make them a perfect fit!

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Why don’t the women dance?

I just spent Simchat Torah in one of the frummer neighborhoods of New York City. You know the type, every block a shtibel, an Agudah, and even the Young Israels are no longer modern. Black hats abound. There are plenty of centrist Orthodox, but they kind of blend in with the Yeshivish crowd. And in no shul do the women actually dance during hakafot on Simchat Torah. Instead, they watch the men.

I actually grew up with that model. When hakafot came around, the mechitza would be opened up so the women could watch the men dance. When I was little, I used to dance & happily wave to my mother. But even in my late teens I started doing my own thing for Simchat Torah and went to more modern neighbrhoods and more modern shuls where the women always danced. This was the first time I’d been back to my old neighborhood for ST in like 20 years.

I didn’t go to my parents’ shul for hakafot – instead I went to a more modern minyan that always used to have women dancing. But that minyan isn’t what it used to be. Except for one part of one hakafa when the women made a half-hearted circle on the other side of the mechitza, there was no dancing at all. I felt very uncomfortable, as if we were performing for an audience of the women.

Why don’t the women dance? Is it just habit, carried over from Eastern Europe? And if so, why didn’t the women dance there? I understand the dispute over whether women should carry a sefer torah while dancing – while I think there’s nothing wrong with it (a sefer torah isn’t mekabel tumah), there are some weak arguments against that. But dancing at all? Women dance up a storm at the frummest weddings, as long as there’s a mechitza. There’s certainly a mechitza in shul. And this isn’t just celebrating a bride & groom, it’s celebrating the Torah itself!

Is there any halachic basis in keeping the women from dancing? Is it just a strange carryover minhag? Or are the frum communities terrified that it would smack of feminism? And why don’t they dance in the Young Israels and other centrist shuls that were Modern Orthodox in the 1970′s and in many case still think of themselves as Modern Orthodox?

Why don’t the women dance?

Cross-posted on DovBear – please leave your comments there

Life is crazy, who has time to blog?

When I got laid off recently, I thought that one silver lining would be that I'd catch up on a lot of blogging, on my own blog, and commenting on others. But it didn't turn out that way. Somehow, the lack of a regular schedule removed my little quiet pockets of time I used to have throughout the work week to spend blogging.

This week is the craziest of all. I'm travelling home after Yom Kippur tonight (2 hour drive), and this week I have job interviews in 2 states, neither of which I live in, have to finish building my sukkah, buy schach and buy a lulav & etrog.

I'll be doing a lot of sleeping on sukkot

Shana Tova!

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God does not exist

I have emunah in God. And yet, he doesn’t exist. Let me clarify.

What’s the common definition of existence? Something that has a tangible reality as defined by empiricism. God doesn’t meet that criteria, at least not the contemporary idea of an incorporeal god. Through much of the early middle ages, Jews believed that God had a body.

But now, we believe Him to be intangible and incorporeal. So he doesn’t exist.

That’s why I think “belief” is such a poor translation of “emunah”. I have emunah in Hashem. I feel that outside of the reality of our world there is a spiritual realm and it is in that spiritual realm that God is. I use “feel” because that’s what it is. It’s about an emotional connection, not an empirical one.

That’s why I feel that those who try to “prove” God are on the wrong track. You can never prove God’s existence, because by all standards of measurement that we use in our physical plane, God doesn’t exist.

JBlogger convention

Wasn't that supposed to be yesterday? I totally forgot. Seems to be a lot less discussion of it on the blogs I frequent than there was last year. Did anyone attend? (Either live or online) How was it?

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CNN: Let’s represent Maine voters with lobsters

Talk about gimmicks! Couldn’t they just use apples? Or how about being really radical and just using numbers?

The yeshivish life treadmill

On Her Own writes about a young woman she knows who seems unhappily trapped in the yeshivish lifestyle:

“(she) cried to me for half an hour about how she hated wearing her sheitel (she said it pulled her hair out), how she felt like she’d thrown away her life, etc., etc…

…stood before me in her snood, shlumpy clothing covering a slouching and unhealthy looking figure, telling me in a monotone voice about her kids and the yeshiva in which her husband is learning”

Here’s my comment to her post:

I feel for that girl, and unfortunately know so many people just like her, both men & women.

I think that the treadmill of seminary-marriage-kollel is a bit of a game. The people on this treadmill don’t really think about the permanent ramifications of the treadmill until it’s too late, until they’re stuck in that life. The turning point is children and that usually happens pretty fast. Once kids are involved, there’s rarely any turning back.

Perhaps that’s why the yeshivish world urges this path – they know that marriage & kids are the quickest way of locking (very) young adults into the “torah true” lifestyle.