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Mordecai Rotem has been called a lot of things by Orthodox Jews — but almost never "rabbi."

In 1980, Rotem became the first Israeli ordained in Israel by the Reform movement. He has since endured countless slurs from his more traditional counterparts.

One Haifa rabbi will refer to him only as "doctor," though Rotem has neither a medical degree nor a doctorate. Another neighborhood rabbi told congregants they'd be better off at the beach on Yom Kippur, than in Rotem's synagogue.

Occasionally, a fellow Israeli will meet Rotem on the street and demand to know: "What kind of a rabbi are you? You're not wearing a kippah."

Such incidents once bothered the 49-year-old Haifa native.

"I'm not offended anymore. But it's not polite," Rotem said last week in San Francisco.

Though strained political relations between Orthodox and non-Orthodox receive constant attention, Rotem's story offers a more personal glimpe into the issue.

Rotem was raised in a "typical secular Israeli home," where Jewish laws weren't strictly observed. Still, he attended Orthodox synagogues with his father on holidays and celebrated his bar mitzvah in one.

In 1964, the 16-year-old headed to Los Angeles as an exchange student through the North American Federation of Temple Youth. Attending his first Reform service, Rotem discovered a sense of spirituality and community he'd never experienced in an Orthodox shul.

"I found an expression of Judaism I thought was needed in Israel then and I still believe is needed in Israel now," said Rotem, on a fund-raising drive for his congregation and a speaking tour sponsored by the Association of Reform Zionists of America.

Looking back three decades, Rotem can't recall what moved him so deeply. But he knows he underwent a transformation.

"I came back and said, `I'm going to be a Reform rabbi.'"

His parents treated him like a 5-year-old declaring his intention to become a firefighter. "They said, `You'll get over it.'"

Instead he joined a fledgling Reform congregation in Haifa, so small that he alone became its "youth group." That congregation is known today as Or Hadash, the Lyons Center for Progressive Judaism.

It is the congregation that Rotem now leads.

His ordination, however, wasn't simple. After his military service in the late 1960s, Rotem enrolled at Hebrew University and began work as a "para-rabbi" in Netanya. He earned a master's degree in biblical studies and enrolled in the Reform movement's Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem.

In 1974, he finished his HUC classes. At the time, however, the Reform movement would only ordain rabbis in Cincinnati. Two other Israelis had done so. But not Rotem. "I insisted on being ordained in Israel."

He returned to Haifa and began to serve Or Hadash without smicha (rabbinic ordination).

His principles forced him to wait another six years before the Reform movement would break with the past and decide to ordain a rabbi in the Jewish state. Since his ordination in 1980, another 17 Israelis have followed suit.

Rotem readily acknowledges the reality of the Reform movement in Israel. There are only 20 Reform congregations, with membership ranging from 10 households to more than 300. "To be honest about it, it's not strong."

He is unsure how many Reform Jews live in Israel. While 10,000 to 20,000 attend Reform events in a typical year, a much smaller number call themselves Reform.

But he sees reasons for hope.

For example, Or Hadash met weekly in a Haifa movie theater for years. In 1991, it finally moved into a newly built, sand-colored building near the top of Mount Carmel with a view of Haifa's bay.

Or Hadash, with 200 households and a mailing list of another 1,100, is now among Israel's four largest Reform temples.

With a sense of irony, Rotem described how Orthodox rabbis have treated him poorly despite the fact that Reform Judaism in Israel is much more traditional than it is in the United States.

The movement in the Jewish state is still based on the principles of egalitarianism and social action. But Reform rabbis there don't perform intermarriages. They haven't accepted patrilineal descent. Their synagogues keep kosher. Their prayerbook, in Hebrew of course, is much closer to an Orthodox siddur than to the "Gates of Prayer."

Though he doesn't wear a kippah for ordinary tasks, Rotem does don one for sacred work such as worship or study. In fact, inside his coat pocket rests a neatly folded black kippah, edged with gold — ready for use.

And unlike Orthodox Jews who believe Reform Judaism is eroding the religion, Rotem believes his movement will ultimately save Israel's largely secular soul.

In fact, he predicts that Orthodox Judaism, though a powerful force in Israel, will never win acceptance by most Israelis.

This will leave millions of Israelis with only one other major belief system — secularism, which Rotem denounces as "diluted and deluded" because it lacks depth, emotion or God.

"If we stay either-or, we'll be `or,'" he said."And `or' is nothing."