Dear MZ1,
According to the "Jewish Outreach Institute", "According to a 1990
Jewish Population Survey, the most recent numbers available, there are
720,000 interfaith married couples. Given that this survey was twelve
years ago, the number is likely to be higher, at around 1,000,000
intermarried couples. According to the 1990 survey, 28% of the 2.6
million married Jews in the U.S. are married to non-Jews and the rate
of intermarriage was 52% of all marriages involving at least one Jew."
(Source, The Jewish Outreach Institute, "How Many Jews Are
Intermarried?" <http://www.joi.org/qa/stats.shtml>).
There are several sites that support this statistics and add some
others, such as the annual number of interfaith marriages. "While
statistics on interfaith marriages are hard to come by, spiritual
leaders agree the numbers are growing and estimates range as high as
40,000 interfaith marriages per year. " (Source: Interfaith Family.com
<http://www.interfaithfamily.com/article/issue75/cavaan.phtml>).
"Recent statistics in the U.S. show that at least 60 percent of
Catholics between the ages of 18-38 are married to non-Catholics, and
50 percent of recent Jewish marriages are to non-Jews. " (Source: Love
Track.com <http://www.love-track.com/cc/cc_f_one_rabbirev.html>).
The information regarding the education of interfaith children is also
interesting: "Some within the American Jewish community have gone so
far as to portray interfaith marriages as a boon, an opportunity to
inject new blood. That claim, however, is not only counter-intuitive
but counter-factual. Today in America, there are more children under
nine being raised in homes where only one of the parents is Jewish
than those being raised in homes in which both parents are Jewish
(479,000 versus 410,000).
In the former homes, 41% of the children are raised as non-Jews and
31% without any religion. Two-thirds of such mixed homes have
Christmas trees while only 20% celebrate Jewish holidays. Not
surprisingly, 90% of the children of these mixed marriages themselves
marry non-Jews. (The chilling statistics can all be found in Elliot
Abrams, Faith or Fear: How Can Jews Survive in Christian America.)"
(Source: "One Jew, wanting to marry another Jew, is not racist",
Jewish Media Sources.org www.jewishmediaresources.org/article/193/ -
14k - Cached - Similar pages
All of these three sites:
http://www.joi.org ,
http://www.interfaithfamily.com and
http://www.love-track.com
provide further interesting information regarding interfaith
marriages.
About.com has some interesting information, but there are many pop-ups
and useless commercial information there:
http://marriage.about.com/cs/interfaith/
My search strategy was to search for "statistics" on "interfaith
marriages" and "jewish". |
