Dear Rebbetzin Jungreis

I am in my second year of college and recently met a wonderful, intelligent,
compassionate young man. I am very much in love with him. He is not Jewish,
however, and this seems to be a "tragedy" to my parents. Rebbetzin, I just
cannot understand it. My parents are not religious people. Their entire
Judaism consists of buying High Holiday tickets once a year. They do not keep
a kosher home, they do not observe any of the customs and traditions, and
they never gave me a Jewish education. So how on earth can they censor me for
wanting to marry this boy?

Believe me, Rebbetzin, my parents are no more Jewish than my boyfriend. He is
a good hearted, kind individual, with all the characteristics of what my
parents consider a "nice Jewish boy". The real reason that my parents are
opposed to him is because they are worried what people will say. They don't
really care about my happiness, but what others will say and how this will
reflect on them.

I cannot see any difference between being Jewish or gentile, we are all
created by God, and therefore we are all brothers. My parents never gave me a
Jewish upbringing so why should I care?

I have reached the point where we are about to announce our
engagement--unless you can show me a reason not to.

I have no respect for the hypocrisy around me.

Yours Sincerely,

Jewish in Name Only
Boston

Dear Jewish in Name Only,

While it is true that your parents have failed to give you a Jewish
education, their negligence does not exonerate you from YOUR responsibility,
nor does it permit you to walk away from your people. There is no
justification for abandoning your faith, your people or your God. Understand
that by opting for intermarriage you are bringing your family's Jewish
existence to a close after thousands of years.

Nevertheless, I can comprehend your feelings of resentment at having been
deprived of a Jewish education. Judaism has never been made meaningful to
you....you have never been challenged by its majestic call. Therefore, it is
understandable that you feel apathetic, if not hostile, to your faith. And
so, under the circumstances it would not seem realistic to demand that you
sacrifice the man you love for a religion which is unrelated to your life.

We must, however, confront the truth: you belong to a generation of American
Jews who have been short-changed. although you have been given every
educational and material opportunity, you have been Jewishly deprived. You
were raised in a spiritual wasteland....in a vacuum. Your contacts with
Judaism have at best turned you off, and at worst, provoked you to disdain.

whenever I visit a high school or college campus I am confronted by young
Jews who are articulate in every subject but their own....Young Jews who are
experts in investment banking, computers and the sciences....who are senstive
to the nuances of music and who are at home in the arts and culture. Yet if
confronted with the most elementary questions about spirituality, Jewish
thought, the Bible or the Talmud--they remain totally inarticulate. We have
become a people who suffer from amnesia; a people without a past, without a
memory.

In order for you to comprehend the magnitude of your loss you must first gain
some awareness of that which you once possessed. But you sadly lack this
awareness. Therefore as I see it, the problem at hand is not so much to
persuade you to give up this relationship, as it is to open your mind and
your heart to your own glorious history and destiny. Once you comprehend this
then forgoing intermarriage will be a natural byproduct of your newly gained
insight, for it is impossible to be knowledgeable of Torah and at the same
time remain impervious to its mystical call.

And so, my friend, while I can empathize with your apathetic state of mind, I
cannot condone it, for YOU ARE A JEW, and you have a responsibility. Before
you relinquish your heritage, before you give up the faith of your fathers
and mothers, you owe it to yourself to discover your roots: to probe your
history so that the decision you ultimately make will be one that is informed
and intelligent rather than one based on ignorance and default.

Yours,

Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis

http://www.simpletoremember.com/vitals/intermarriage-rebbetzen.htm