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Efforts are made to welcome people and help them deepen their Jewish commitments and learning, without expending energy on defining the boundaries of who is in and who is out.
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What unites us is our sense of Jewish identity, our determination to give it meaning and purpose, our openness and inclusivity, our commitment to the Jewish journey.
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Different interpretations are welcomed, and critical thinking encouraged.
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We are there to engage with people and facilitate the individual journey, which can take many different forms and paths.
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the authentic Jewish voice is maintained through an unmediated engagement with Jewish texts and tradition
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We include Jews whom the outside world might call secular – Jews who have major questions about belief and who do not express their spirituality through prayer
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We see the Torah as our foundation document and love Jewish learning.
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Reform Judaism is Judaism’s most positive response to the terrain of the last 200 years.
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While men and women are not necessarily seen as identical, they are treated equally in terms of access to leadership, learning and engagement
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We share a recognition that there are many ways of experiencing the faith of Judaism, understanding Torah and loving Israel.
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'The mission of the Movement for Reform Judaism is to reach out to people and meet them ‘where they are’ in the world of the 21st century -
We understand that there are few values greater than humility in the truth claims we make and working with others to repair the world.
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each of us is responsible for his or her personal Jewish journey and there are many of them, many paths, many ways
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Reform Jews are those who don’t underestimate the challenge of modernity but can also see that it offers new ways of understanding and thinking
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we serve God not just through prayer and ritual but in the way we behave towards our fellow human beings
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There is no one pathway that everyone must follow to be authentic
What is our Mission as a Movement?
If we go back to the years of classical rabbinic Judaism, to the time of the Talmud, we find that Judaism was full of discussion and debate – admittedly just between rabbis. Since then, Judaism has become much more regimented and inflexible.
However, we live at a time when people, rightly, question authority. We have grown up and learned to think for ourselves. Above all, we have discovered that there is seldom, if ever, one right way that works for everyone.
In fact, each of us is responsible for his or her personal Jewish journey and there are many of them, many paths, many ways.
The mission of the Movement for Reform Judaism is to reach out to people and meet them ‘where they are’ in the world of the 21st century with all its opportunities and ideas; violence and moral cynicism. We are there to engage with people and facilitate the individual journey, which can take many different forms and paths.
We are there for all Jews who want to think for themselves, who want to walk their own particular Jewish walk but accept that they are also part of a people, responsible for community, bearers of a tradition, prepared to commit to journeying on together.
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