Naomi Schaefer Riley

What a fascinating book. I started reading this because it's a topic that is completely affecting the Jewish community today. It was interesting to see all the different perspectives that were being portrayed. This is a very divisive topic in the Jewish community as I am sure it is in many other communities as well.

As someone who is single but wholly committed to her faith, I'm not sure, especially after reading this book, how this will impact my future marriage and life with children. I've show more always just assumed that I would marry someone Jewish even though I've dated non-Jews. Now that I'm thirty, I'm not sure if I want to narrow myself to just Jews but on the other hand, I want to make sure that my Jewish values stay strong and true and this may not be something that is so easy if I'm married to someone who isn't Jewish. Lots of food for thought. show less

This book is a penetrating and nuanced look at the sociological underpinnings of intermarriage between different previously-endogamous religious communities in 20th and 21st century North America. The book treats intermarriage neither as an ill to be combatted, nor as a triumph of tolerance, but rather as a phenomenon whose implications are decidedly mixed, both for the families involved, and for the religious communities that support them and enrich their lives. Neither doomsaying or show more pollyannish, the book does a good job of unpacking and bringing to light the complexities of intermarried family life — including that of the author. show less

Riley's exploration of interfaith marriages is grounded in a nationwide survey she conducted of over two thousand interfaith couples and several hundred in-depth interviews. Overall, I was impressed by her thoughtful analysis and believe the study is a solid contribution to the field. I was particularly pleased that Riley -- a Jewish woman married to a Christian man -- ranged beyond the Judeo-Christian context to look at a variety of other cross-religion pairings. A few minor notes: I was show more puzzled by her categorization of mainline-evangelical Christian unions as "interfaith"; while clearly such couples will come from different religious culture backgrounds, they are not interfaith in the sense most people understand. I was also frustrated with her subtle dismissal of the possibility that people with common values might find their different religious upbringings less important than current beliefs and practices. I don't think "common values" is necessarily a wishy-washy glossing over of difference; it can (and often does) have real thought behind it. And finally, I was struck by her pessimism and sense of struggle: her overall fear that interfaith marriage will dilute religious traditions and lead to greater unhappiness for couples and less religious identity and grounding for their children. Left unanswered was the obvious question: if there are so many downsides to interfaith unions, how and why are they growing exponentially here in the U.S.? show less

This book takes the work of the author in studying the many varied relationships of interfaith couples and presents it to the general public. She gives readers a very comprehensive look at many different aspects of the relationships: getting to know each other, wedding ceremonies, kids, ect. Personal stories and interviews are scattered throughout the book to mix up the extreme amount of data that is thrown at readers. All in all, the content is fairly solid. I was surprised by the material show more and it made me reevaluate my own relationship. It isn't a turn pager, but those interested in the subject should stay engaged.
However, this ebook has a massive amount of grammatical errors. I doubt that this has gotten through much of the editing process yet. Even worse, the tables were not formatted at all and made those sections (which I actually wanted to see!) completely un-readable. This made a dry ebook a great chore to read.
If you really want to know more about this topic, take a chance reading it, but buy a paper copy. If you have passing curiosity, go elsewhere. show less