I wanted you to know that I spent last shabbos at Indian Lakes Restort with 400+ members of the conservative movement’s Federation of Jewish Men’s Club officers and die hard members. i was not a participant in their annual national convention, but worked as the event coordinator for the kof-k caterer who fed these men and a few women. I will be eventually be blogging about the postive things I saw over the course of the weekend, but as a general statement, I will say that even the post educated of the people I met were basically clueless in terms of hilchos shabbos and the basic day to day life of an orthodox jew. The are (the conservative movement) very interested in our outreach techniques and the word ‘kiruv’ came up in several conversations I had. Including a half hour discussion I had with the great great grandson of R Yitzchak Elchanon Spektor (I got chills when he told me about his ‘orthodox ancestor”. It was an eye opening weekend for me. I got a view of the conservative movement that even some of the most experienced ‘kiruv professionals’ could only dream of.The fact that I was one of the first frum people that many of these grown men (who live in major cities) have ever met is justification enough for your posting.
For further reading I highly suggest this article published in 2000 in Moment Magazine, as THE CONSERVATIVE LIE (originally titled TIME TO COME HOME) by Rabbi Avi Shafran
