Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JTA) — The Orthodox Jewish community boasts a wide array of creative services providers. And, in keeping with the Jewish religious tradition over millennia, those vendors cannot, in good conscience, buy into elements of “progressive” social developments. They do not accept, for instance, that it is proper to identify as a different sex from one’s biological one, or that a same-sex union is proper. That is why my organization took a particular interest in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, in which the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Lorie Smith,...
(JTA) — Agudath Israel of America, the national Orthodox Jewish organization for which I work, welcomed the U.S. Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade. Predictably, we were immediately cast into an “enemy” or “ally” box, depending on who was doing the casting. The first group assumed that we don’t care about women; the second, that we were embracing the Christian evangelical agenda. Neither is remotely the case. We care about Judaism and embrace only it. From a Jewish perspective, to be sure, the contention that there can be entirely prop...
“We recognize there are not two sides of the Holocaust.” So spoke Texas school superintendent Lane Ledbetter, apologizing for North Texas school administrator Gina Peddy’s remark, surreptitiously recorded by someone among a group of teachers, that they should “make sure that if you have a book on the Holocaust, that you have one that has opposing, that has other perspectives.” “How do you oppose the Holocaust?” an unidentified and understandably puzzled participant was heard to ask. Well, you don’t, of course. Which is what Ledbetter felt the n...
NEW YORK (JTA)—Although it hasn’t yet been determined whether the brutal stabbing of a young father on his way to morning prayers in Ramapo, New York, was a an anti-Jewish hate crime, it was described by the local police chief as a “vicious, violent attack” and would certainly fit the ugly pattern of violence against identifiably Jewish Jews over recent months. Like the 64-year-old rabbi who was hit in the head with a brick while on his daily morning walk in Crown Heights. He was hospitalized with “a broken nose, missing teeth, stitches...
NEW YORK (JTA)—A recently released Pew Research Center report about global restrictions on religion focuses mostly on discrimination against, and the persecution of, various religious groups in different countries. Jews are prominent targets as always, “harassed in 87 countries... the third-highest figure for any religion.” But the report also turns a spotlight on Israel, yielding headlines like the Jewish Telegraphic Agency’s “Israel has almost as many religious restrictions as Iran.” The headline and the report beneath it were picked up b...
NEW YORK (JTA)—As in all life matters, when it comes to abortion, Judaism doesn’t speak of rights but of responsibilities and obligations. Seeing things through that lens can be a real eye opener. The concept of “rights” is deeply ingrained in our Western minds. We rarely stop to question it. But the idea, as wonderful as it is and as helpful as it has been to humanity, doesn’t coexist very cozily with a fundamental Jewish truth: Everything benefiting us isn’t due us, but is rather a gift that we are charged to use responsibly in the service...
