Friends, colleagues, even family members frequently admonish me that my universe of Jewish discourse consists primarily of active Jews. As a result, these well-wishers tell me, I am spending too much time addressing AJC leadership, where I work, the modern Orthodox community where I live, and the Jewish Theological Seminary, where I frequently teach. Rather than address the universe of committed Jews primarily, I am therefore urged to “get out of the bubble” and find out what is on the minds and hearts of Jews in the street.

To be sure, it is not as if I have no contact with “Jews out there.” One of my sons encouraged me to read Heeb Magazine so that I might acquaint myself with the likes of Noam Chomsky and Cornell West on Zionism and Israel. Having spent much of the past year considering Tony Judt, Stephen Walt, and Charles Mearsheimer, I really was not all that surprised by Chomsky and West – at least Chomsky had the good sense to repudiate Walt/ Mearsheimer. By the same token, at the invitation of some very well-intentioned young Jews two years ago, I agreed to debate Douglas Rushkoff, a well-known Jewish author and professor of communications. What did surprise me in that encounter, as I then noted publicly, was the minimal role of Jewish peoplehood in Rushkoff’s Jewish identity and, as a result, the broad gulf that existed between us.

This past summer, however, my attention turned again to what young Jews interested in exploring their Jewishness were saying about Jewish identity, Israel, and Jewish peoplehood. Professor Jack Wertheimer, a long-time friend and colleague, directed me to an on-line exchange between himself and an editor of Jewcy, ominously entitled, “The End of the Jewish People.” “Required reading for all Jewish leaders,” Jack advised me. The majority of Jewcy’s staff have part-Jewish parentage and half-jokingly refer to themselves as the “first generation of Mongrel Jews.”

Indeed, I was not disappointed. Young Jews at Jewcy were saying things I needed to hear and to ponder Jewish communal responses. For one thing, these activist Jews were challenging leadership visions of the Jewish future. Some of their arguments were actually quite compelling – particularly that their world as American Jews is not at all threatened by anti-Semitism. As a result, appeals to Jewish identity based upon Holocaust memory or Jewish fears fail to resonate with this constituency suggesting that the Jewish community has invested far too much of its resources in educating the next generation about how Jews died rather than about how they lived. Correctly, these Jews defined being a Jew as looking beyond the self to broader commitments. Lastly, they expressed considerable interest in seeking out Jewish texts and probing them for their contemporary salience.

These currents appear quite healthy and augur well for the Jewish future. What I found disturbing was the Jewcy author’s dismissal of peoplehood, the rejection of endogamy as contemporary value, and the willingness to court schism within the Jewish body politic. The author begins by saying “the era of peoplehood has ended” and “I don’t regard the Jewish people as my family” – statements reminiscent of Hannah Arendt’s dismissal of “ahavat yisroel” as a value in her indictment of Jewish leadership in the context of her coverage of the Eichman trial over four decades ago. Looking to the future, the author notes “Judaism cannot thrive amongst a significant proportion of young American Jews unless we jettison the language and ideology of peoplehood.”

Strong words indeed. In effect, the author admonishes contemporary Jewish leaders that efforts to secure future continuity and renewal will fail as long as we underscore the collective welfare of the Jewish people. So much for communal concerns about Hamas, Hezbollah, to say nothing of Iran. Whatever our worries about these groups, we are told that Jewish peoplehood is irrelevant and, in some respects, counterproductive to securing Jewish continuity.

Turning to more personal concerns the author, speaking on behalf of young Jews, notes “ to a one [at Jewcy] we regard the traditional Jewish revulsion towards exogamy as an anachronism” claiming “it is unspeakably alien, almost laughable, to imagine that someone is a less appropriate object of our love and commitment because of the particulars of their geneology.” Encouraging endogamy for reasons of sustaining group identity and distinctiveness have now become virtually racist for young Jews. To be sure, considerable tension exists between American ideals of romantic love and Jewish preferences for endogamy. The answer, however, lies not in jettisoning endogamy, which would be a true communal disaster, but learning how to balance respect for personal choice with articulation of communal norms.

Similarly, speaking on behalf of children of mixed-marrieds, the author invokes a “Merry Chrismukkah” greeting card while claiming that “We’re evolving new ideas and new forms of religious expression informed by non-Jewish traditions. This is not because we have poached from alien traditions, but because those traditions, too, are our patrimony.”

Lastly, the author concedes that these views will result in a schism with Orthodox Jews and “all others that choose to retain that peoplehood-centered Judaism” presumably including most Jewish organizations, for whom peoplehood remains the primary banner, as well as the non-Orthodox religious movements, who continue to oppose intermarriage in principle even while attempting to be inclusive of those who are mixed-married. Orthodoxy, in turn, will only grow in numbers and significance in the years ahead. Those unconcerned with peoplehood, however, place little value upon Jewish collective welfare or mutual responsibility. On the contrary, commitment to the welfare of the Jewish people “forms part of an ethnocentric cult that [is finished].”

How do we respond to such comments? For outreach advocates Jewcy Jews represent a success story. They consider themselves at least partly Jewish and care enough to visit a Jewish website. Realistically, however, are we now expected to blithely accept their dismissal of the collective Jewish welfare as a backward cult lest we antagonize well-meaning Jewish seekers? How successfully can outreach counteract the dual-heritage if not religious syncretism which this self-styled cohort publicly affirms? Most importantly, how will the ever-accommodating Jewish community respond when mixed-marrieds and their offspring demand the incorporation of their mixed “patrimony” of dual religions and cultures into Judaism? Only time will tell whether the personalism of Jews with mixed religious identities will work existentially for spiritual seekers. The absence of any identification with Israel or with the historical experience of the Jewish people, however, should give us pause. Sustaining the position of the Jews as a distinctive minority in American society warrants greater clarity and less ambiguity of Jewish identity. Outreach efforts designed to secure unambiguous Jewish identities certainly merit communal support. Conversely, outreach efforts that primarily validate whatever mixed marrieds happen to be doing do not.

At present, much is happening that will strengthen Jewish identity – growing support for Jewish day schools, summer camps, and trips to Israel. Emerging new leadership promises to invigorate each of the religious movements. Major philanthropic resources are being mobilized to help secure the Jewish future. All Jewish leaders should trumpet these initiatives.

Yet we do need to ask ourselves, how do we respond to such personalized Jewish identities? Some may dismiss them as destructive or trivialize them as youthful rebellion. Others claim that their commitment to peoplehood will in fact grow over time. Still others claim that the very creation of boundaries is unethical as it will cause tragedy and rejection for individuals.

Minorities, however, do require boundaries to maintain future continuity and cultural distinctiveness. Jewish leaders do underscore peoplehood both as a fundamental Jewish value and because the Jews, unfortunately, do face very significant external threats. Efforts at encouraging Jews to be Jewish, no matter how well-intentioned, should never be interpreted as sanctioning whatever it is that Jews happen to be doing. Jewish peoplehood by no means negates individual self-fulfillment. Yet it does ask of its members to weigh personal decision making in the context of the collective welfare of the Jews as a people.

Therefore, taking the voices of Jewcy Jews and other young Jews seriously means candid dialogue. It means listening to their voices, absorbing their criticisms, but also sharing with them communal disagreements. All too often, that candor is missing from Jewish communal discourse. At times we appear so fearful of losing people that we are unable to sustain honest dialogue in which we both hear the critical voices of young people and respond accordingly with candid statements and counter-arguments. Sustaining the Jewish future is hardly the monopoly of any one sector of the Jews. It will require an across the board commitment among all sectors to enrich and sustain the Jewish future. Without question, the values of pluralism and diversity mandate that no single solution will work for all Jews. But we prosper only when we have honest give and take between different Jews advancing their positions respectfully and willing to listen when candid criticisms are voiced.

Steven Bayme is director of AJC’s Department of Contemporary Jewish Life.