American University students Sharon Burk, left, and Mollie Wagoner share a kiss outside the U.S. Supreme Court building in Washington after hearing that the high court ruled the Defense of Marriage Act was unconstitutional, June 26, 2013 in Washington, DC. (Mark Wilson\/Getty)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Congregation Beth Israel\u2019s Rabbi Uri Topolosky took some time to consider a proper response. “From my perspective we have to do a better job in making sure that people feel welcome regardless of anything<\/em>,” he said. “There\u2019s no reason to judge somebody based on anything – <\/em>on race, on ethnicity, on gender or sexual orientation. We have a commandment to love everyone. That should be our guiding principle,” Topolosky averred.<\/p>\nCongregation Anshe Sfard’s Rabbi David Polsky preferred to hearken back to a drosh <\/em>(commentary) he delivered recently. “I can say that Parshat Kedoshin, which was two months ago, I did actually give a talk discussing homosexuality and Judaism,” he recalled. “I did discuss marriage equality and I said I was in favor of it being legalized on a civil level,” Polsky continued.<\/p>\nHe went on to state his personal opinion that “at the very least I thought it was a bad idea and counterproductive for Judaism to be at the forefront of opposing it.”<\/p>\n
Leaders of the Conservative movement\u2019s Rabbinical Assembly (RA), the umbrella organization of Conservative rabbis also celebrated the decisions. \u201cOn behalf of the 1,700 rabbis of the Rabbinical Assembly, I join with Jews across California and the United States in acknowledging today\u2019s Supreme Court decisions as opening the way for loving and committed same-sex couples to enjoy the rights and privileges of marriage,\u201d wrote RA president Rabbi Gerald Skolnik..<\/p>\n
Skolnik\u00a0 reminded everyone of the Jewish principal, whose lawsuit was the basis for the overturning of DOMA. \u201cThis is most clearly modeled in the case of Edith Windsor, a Holocaust survivor who enjoyed a loving relationship with her wife of many decades, and had been unable to inherit her partner\u2019s estate as her spouse,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n
Shir Chadash Conservative Synagogue’s Rabbi Ethan Linden was also full of praise of the decision. “I’ve spoken a D’var Torah <\/em>(Torah commentary) on the need to legalize gay marriage, certainly from the perspective of civil law,” he stated. “It’s absolutely the correct position,” he said in talking about same-sex partners who marry in other states and move to Louisiana. “Now they now they will be protected regardless of what the State of Louisiana does.”<\/p>\nRabbi Mendel Rivkin, a spokesman for Louisiana Chabad Lubavitch, said the organization prefers to keep out of commenting on politics. “Our job is to promote Judaism and that’s what we do and we stay out of political commentating. We certainly don\u2019t see that as our job to be involved in those sort of things,” he said.<\/p>\n
According to a recent poll, 52% of Americans nationwide are in favor of same-sex marriages, while 81% of Jews favor them. That makes American Jewry the largest organized religious group in favor\u00a0 of same-sex marriages.<\/p>\n
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