Israel's Conservative Seminary Says No to Gay Students

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Last update - 03:55 29/03/2007

Israel's Conservative seminary says no to homosexual students
By Amiram Barkat

Gay and lesbian students will not be admitted to Jerusalem's Schechter Rabbinical Seminary, the rabbinical school of the Conservative (Masorti) Movement in Israel, following a decision by the seminary's dean, Rabbi Dr. Einat Ramon. In December, the world Conservative movement decided to permit the ordination of homosexuals.

Ramon's announcement came a day after the movement's flagship educational institution, New York's Jewish Theological Seminary, moved to admit gay and lesbian rabbinical school applicants. In explaining her decision, Ramon cited the "historic centrality of heterosexual unions to Judaism." She said that Jewish law did and does unconditionally oppose sexual relations between people of the same gender, and that Schechter accepts only those students who are committed to an observant lifestyle.

"I am sorry that Rabbi Ramon, who as a feminist has enjoyed the option afforded to women to become rabbis, has not continued the trend begun by Jewish feminism," Rabbi David Lazar, rabbi of the Masorti (Conservative) Congregation Tiferet Shalom in Tel Aviv, said in response. Lazar supports the ordination of gay and lesbian rabbis and gay marriage. He said Ramon does not realize that the institution of the family has developed recently and that many homosexual couples give birth to children.