KnarlyDUDE09 wrote:
Don't you think that statement's a little bit of a generalization?
No.
I know of no Orthodox congregation in this country or the United States in which I would be welcomed, as an openly gay man, to full participation in the religious life of the congregation. And I would never seek to do so. The diversity of options available to me as a Jew means that I could fully participate in the religious life of a congregation that would welcome me with open arms. I don't seek to change Orthodox judaism or alter their views one bit.
Now I will certainly concede that diverse attitudes towards women and LGBT people exist among members of orthodox congregations, and that not all Orthodox congregations present identical views.
But the major institutions of orthodoxy, such as the Yeshiva University maintain a negative posture. Among leading orthodox scholars, the concession to modernism is to view
some homosexuals as diseased, to be treated with compassion, rather than ostracized. Note the empasis, ostracism remains an accepted orthodox practice for those homosexuals who are not viewed as diseased. Now there are naysayers, not least Steven Greenberg. But his is the exceptional case that demonstrates the rather more monolithic view of other Orthodox rabbis.
As for women, change is equally slow. Modernists might divide the synagogue left and right, but divide it they do still. Women are not called to
aliyot, women may not be ordained, and their capacity to act as witnesses before a
bet din have only recently been modified in order to prevent the public scandal of a rabbi getting away with sexual harassment due to a lack of competent witnesses to his conduct.
_________________
--James