The Secrets To An Interfaith Relationship
How couples find compromise living with two gods under one roof.
Wendy, 32, and Joe, 37, had been dating nearly a year before their divergent faiths first gave them pause. "So, what are they like?" Wendy, who was raised Christian, but now describes herself as "spiritual, verging on pagan," asked Joe, who is Jewish, over dinner one night. For weeks, the two had been planning to have dinner at the home of another couple that coming Friday—close family friends of Joe's—whom Wendy was excited to finally meet.
"Um," Joe hesitated. It was rare that he was at a loss for words, but now he looked distinctly uncomfortable.
"There's kind of been a change of plans."
"Oh, did something come up for them?" asked Wendy.
"Well," stammered Joe, "I told them about you. You know, that you weren't Jewish. And…well, they said it's Shabbat, the Sabbath, and they can't really have anyone who's not Jewish at the table," he trailed off.
The couple observed a moment of unintentional silence before Wendy spoke.
"This is like the 2007 version of Guess Who's Coming to Dinner," she finally spluttered.
"I felt like I'd been sucker-punched," she recalls. "A million thoughts sprang to mind, but I didn't know what to say first. I felt scared. And sad. And indignant. And really angry, all at the same time."
Yet, statistics indicate this scene could play out over one in four dinner tables across the country. More than 28 million married or cohabitating Americans—almost one quarter—are interfaith, according to the 2001 American Religious Identification Survey.
The Changing Face of Interfaith
At first blush, you might not even recognize the newest religious fusions. "I've married so many pagans to Jews and Christians," says Reverend Laurie Sue Brockway, an interfaith minister and couples counselor who has performed over 500 interfaith weddings over the course of her career. "They call themselves 'Cath-Wics,' she says. "And then there are the 'Hin-Jews.'"
The truth is, interfaith relationships are on the rise in virtually every American religious community, researchers say. Nearly half of Jewish marriages and 40 percent of Catholic couplings are interfaith. And with Islam, Wicca—an earth-based belief system that predates Christianity—and the Church of Jesus Christ Latter-Day Saints among the fastest-growing American religions, by the year 2050, the most common interfaith pairings might not be the Jewish-Christian matches we most often hear about today. And all of the above combos can be fraught with tension, though the perceived slights may be invisible to the naked eye.
Recently, The New York Times Magazine contributing writer and Harvard law professor Noah Feldman, an Orthodox Jew, wrestled with the challenges of reconciling modern-day life, and love, with tradition. After attending a reunion for his yeshiva, the religious school where he studied for years, he and his Korean-American wife were unceremoniously removed from the alumni group photo when it was printed in the school’s newsletter.
Discussion
Trying to live to the ideals of two religions is frustrating. For 5 years I've been pagan and for 3, I've tried to conceal my beliefs in a church and just appreciate what I can -- the music, architecture, etc. -- but it was incredibly rough on me and I had a hard time believing in my religion.
Children, in my opinion, until age 13 don't have the capacity for abstract thought needed to make decisions in religion and ethics on their own, but they also are individuals with personalities and a personal set of life experiences. They should be let to explore religion at their own will but not held to anything.
I been married three times to jewish man and divorced I think religion has nothing to do with love and respect.
I been married three times to jewish man and divorced I think religion has nothing to do with love and respect.
My religion is love, I love my mother, partner, sister, and my match! If we have everything except love, then we are only mummy, like a slogan of My Biker Date: "All we need is love!"
My husband was a Christian, a minister's kid, and a lay preacher in his church. I am Jewish with a tendency to reconstructionism. We were happily and supportively married, until his death, for 23 years. An interfaith relationship is easily sustainable as long as there is respect on the parts of both partners for the beliefs of the other. Without such respect, not only for religious beliefs but for all the beliefs and opinions of one's partners, the relationship does not have much of a chance of enduring.