Susan Katz Miller's Blog, page 18

Interfaith Millennials: A Pagan and Atheist Couple

Today, we feature a guest post by writer Camille Mellin, on her perspective as a Pagan married to an atheist. You can follow Camille on twitter @Camille_Mellin. For more on religious and atheist interfaith relationships, I highly recommend the recent book In Faith and In Doubt: How Religious Believers and Nonbelievers Can Create Strong Marriages and Loving Families , by Dale McGowan.

I am a Pagan married to an atheist living in New England. We are a young couple and were both stunned at how m...

Immersion: Interfaith Families and Unitarian Universalism

Dramatic arrival in Portland for the UUA General Assembly

Technically, I am not a Unitarian-Universalist (UU), but I spend a lot of time interacting with and thinking about UUs. I sometimes claim the labels of UU wannabe, fauxnitarian, or UU ally. In part, this feels like fate, because I was born on Beacon Hill, the birthplace of American UUism. And my book, Being Both, was published by Beacon Press, the venerable yet feisty publishing house founded by Unitarians in 1854. Theologically, I am...

Rabbi Celebrates Second Bar Mitzvah with Interfaith Community

Rabbi Harold White @stephaniewilliamsimages

Two rabbis, two cantors, a minister, a Catholic priest, a gospel choir, a klezmer band, and an interfaith families community walk into a synagogue to celebrate a bar mitzvah. I’m not joking here. Last Saturday afternoon, my beloved rabbi, Rabbi Harold Saul White, a civil rights and interfaith family rights pioneer, in his eighties and on the verge of retirement, became a man. Again!

Rabbi White lives life to the fullest. He is always seeking to expe...

New Pew Data on Interfaith Marriage. And Coming Soon, on Interfaith Identities

For as long as I have been writing about interfaith families, for decades now, it has been hard to get good data on the overall increase in interfaith marriage in America. This week, Pew Research released the most comprehensive report on religion in America since their 2007 report. The new report, America’s Changing Religious Landscape, and much of the subsequent news reporting, focused on two angles: the rise of the “religious nones,” and the interlinking shift away from traditional forms o...

Being Both vs. Jews For Jesus

Let me be very clear. Raising interfaith children with interfaith education is not the same as being part of the Christian movement known as Jews for Jesus. Sometimes, I describe interfaith family communities as the opposite of Jews for Jesus, since many of both the Jewish and Christian parents see Jesus as a teacher or rabbi, rather than as a messiah. This is in marked contrast to Jews for Jesus or Messianic Judaism, both forms of Christianity that accept Jesus as the Messiah.

This week, a...

Growing Interfaith Family Communities: Atlanta and Beyond

Not a melting pot, but a mosaic…

Last week, we launched the Network of Interfaith Families Groups (NIFG), a facebook group to connect families celebrating both religions. The object was to help these families to find each other, and to chat with leadership from the established groups. For the cover of the group page, I used my photo of a mosaic sun. As interfaith families, we are not melting pots or smoothies, whisked or whirled together, but intricate and careful juxtapositions of many vibra...

Launch! The Network of Interfaith Family Groups (NIFG)

Today, Im excited to announce the launch of the Network of Interfaith Family Groups (NIFG, prounounced niff-gee). This network will help interfaith families who want interfaith education for their children to find each other, across the country, and the globe. For now, you can find NIFG in the form of a facebook group created by and for interfaith families celebrating more than one family religion.

Its all very well to live in one of the big American cities with a vibrant community of interf...

Interfaith Families, The Today Show, The Back Story

A week before Easter and Passover, out of the blue, I got an email from a Today Show producer. She was interested in putting together a segment on interfaith families celebrating both family religions, as part of a week-long series on faith. Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb would host the segment. I agreed to go on the show, of course. Over the next few days, we spent hours discussing my interfaith family and the research I did for my book. And at her request, I scanned and sent in old famil...

Easter as Metaphor: The Rabbi Explains

Every year, I find myself trying to explain how a nice Jewish girl can relate to Easter. Today, the spring sunshine is illuminating the daffodils, as you can see in this photo from my garden. I had an entirely crazy week, including an appearance on the Today Show, gathering in Boston with my Jewish and Catholic and Protestant family at the start of Passover, and then arriving back home just in time for our interfaith families community Easter service. But I had such a lovely Easter, I feel I...

Passover, Good Friday, and Easter: When Interfaith Holidays Converge

This year, I am fielding calls from reporters wanting to know how we handle the dilemma of Passover starting on Good Friday. I know that, especially for young couples just starting their interfaith journey, this convergence of important holidays may create stress. Say, for instance, your in-laws are expecting you for a raucous Passover seder featuring four glasses of wine and glazed brisket: this could be an alienating experience if you are also commemorating the crucifixion of Jesus and av...