What troubles me is your reference to “so-called rabbis” or your claim that “many are essentially Reconstructionist in theology”. This is not my experience in the Northeast U.S., nor do I see it reflected at the Ramah my children attend.

The Conservative movement clearly has a lot of problems and, given its broad definition of “pluralism” is arguably no longer a movement at all, but merely a framework for supporting congregations that are neither Orthodox nor affiliated with Reform.

Harlan, I believe his point was not that members of conservative synagogues are doing “wrong”, but that members of the coservative rabbinate are doing “wrong” (right and wrong being defined by halacha), since conservative is a halachic institution, and the conservative rabbis represent the institution. And the reason presented is that conservative did not previously take the practice up in their law committee, thereby allowing any conservative rabbi, with his limited knowledge and understanding of yoreh deah, to make uninformed decisions by himself, to the point that widespread practice even by rabbis is in contradiction to halacha. And now someone within the “movement”, presumably someone of some stature in halacha, wishes to put the genie back in the bottle. And though what you say is correct about self-described orthodox and Sephardim also mistakenly engaging in the practice, since orthodox semicha itself requires a fairly thorough understanding of yoreh deah, it is a practice not countenanced in orthodox halacha. And parenthetically, although I know of one orthodox rabbi who hot food in a vegetarian restaurant, he checked the restaurant thoroughly to ascertain that there were no nonkosher ingredients in the place, at least, and though there is the issue of bishul akum to contend with, the best that can be said is that he was not the most halachically oriented rabbi I’ve ever met, and probably was not a role model for too many people outside of his community, which was quite, quite liberal, often to a greater degree than even he would say halacha allowed. At issue is what the institution of orthodoxy, or the institution of conservative, claims as proper practice. Evidently, the institution of conservative has avoided the issue officially for a considerable number of years. If the official position comes down to halacha, it will “disenfranchise” the considerable number of conservative-oriented Jews who engage in this practice, as well as those rabbis who do. If it comes down to negating halacha, the institution itself will lose standing relative to the outside world, pushing conservative further to the left and diminishing differentiation between it and reform in practice, and potentially in hashkafa as well, in effect rendering them irrelevant. Elf obviouly bemoans the fact that his chosen affiliation is moving towards irrelevance, and is frustrated. To say this is not constructive dialogue is incorrect, for it has the potential of affecting the eating habits or affiliations of a considerable number of Jews. Elf is not simply bashing.

While I can understand the frustration that you voice, the reality is that there are numerous self described “Orthodox” and many Sephardim who engage in just this practice so to frame this once again as Jews gone wild is not a constructive dialogue. With the global reality that our tribe is the target of scorn and hatred (e.g. Eli Wiesel was nearly kidnapped this past week) we should focus on constructive not destructive discussions (particularly in this public forum.)

I think you said it all. I wonder what the conservative position on the subject will be. Or will they write several competing and contradictory teshuvos?