One of the little-discussed effects of the economic recession on the Jewish community is that more rabbis in the later stages of their careers are finding themselves out of work.
And that’s causing a good deal of bitterness and concern in the rabbinic community about the dwindling, and changing, nature of the profession.
“We’re seeing the end of the rabbinate as we know it,” a 56-year-old Reform rabbi insisted, noting that congregations today are looking for “comfort,” not challenges. “The intellectual tradition of the pulpit has died,” added the rabbi, who asked not to be named out of concern for the prospects for his next job search.
The data is sketchy and the reasons differ as to just why the rabbinic market is falling. But a number of people close to the situation say that with Conservative and Reform synagogues losing an estimated 20 to 30 percent of their membership, rabbis increasingly are the sacrificial lambs on the altar of congregational cost-saving.
The Orthodox community does not appear to be experiencing a decline, but within the liberal movements there are stories of rabbis let go to make room for a merger between two synagogues, rabbis finding their full-time position cut to half- or part-time, even rabbis on food stamps.
Rabbi Leonard Thal, who came out of retirement as senior vice president of the Union for Reform Judaism to serve as interim director of rabbinic placement at the movement’s Central Conference of American Rabbis, said there is “no question that Reform congregations and rabbis have been hit” by what he calls “a perfect storm.”
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Gary Rosenblatt is editor and publisher of New York Jewish Week, where this column originally appeared.