Related Blog Posts on Advocacy, Conversion, and What is Reform Judaism?

On the Outside Looking In: Approaching Conversion

Susan Elliott Brown

Next week at this time, I’ll be stepping into the mikveh, the Jewish ritual bath. It’s been a yearlong journey that will lead me to that holy space, one I’ll enter as a former Catholic/not-quite-Jew and exit as a Jewish woman – no longer an outsider.

What I Learned as a Member of a Beit Din

Lorne Basskin
I recently had the wonderful opportunity to serve on a beit din, a panel of two Jewishly knowledgeable witnesses and a rabbi tasked with overseeing the conversion of a person in our congregation. Our task was to determine if the person had undertaken adequate preparation to become a Jew, was doing so of her own free will and desire, and if she knew what to expect living as a Jew.

My Thanksgivukkah Anxieties

When I first heard the term “Thanksgivukkah”—the convergence of Chanukah and Thanksgiving—and that it was happening this year, I must admit that I became a little anxious because it brought back some of my interfaith marriage insecurities that I thought were long gone.