The number of Jews in the United States will drop below 5,000,000 by 1975 and their percentage within the entire population will decline by nearly one-third, Dr. Arthur T. Jacobs, administrative secretary of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, declared here today at the five-day meeting of the National Association of Temple Secretaries of the Reform movement.
Drawing on a recent Federal Census Bureau survey of the population, Dr. Jacobs said that while Protestants and Catholics were increasing in numbers and percentages, Jews were failing to maintain their own position and would, in less than 20 years, decline from 3.2 percent of the population to 2.2 percent. The Census Bureau’s survey was the first in which a representative population sample was asked: “What is your religion?”
Other than increasing the birth rate, Dr. Jacobs pointed out, two possibilities exist for increasing the number of Jews: through immigration or conversion of Christians. He said large-scale Jewish immigration was “beyond the realm of our expectations” but replacement of the McCarran Walter Act by “a decent immigration law” might swell the “present trickle of Jewish immigration into a small stream.” Dr. Jacobs expressed the opinion that there are hundreds of thousands of nominal Christians who would find Reform Judaism a “satisfying religion,” but it could not come about “unless our rabbis come to believe it necessary and are given time and tools to do the job,” he said.
The Reform leader noted that population statistics highlighted another important congregational problem–service to aging Jews. The latest statistics, he pointed out, showed that over 37 percent of American Jews were past 45 and that there were already an excess of 43,000 Jewish women over Jewish men in the age groups past 65. He warned that unless the Reform congregations became “sensitive to this problem,” they would “either lose this older group or retain them as nominal members” but fail to serve them adequately.
Dr. Jacobs dwelt, too, on the plight of Reform synagogues which find themselves isolated in rapidly changing and deteriorating neighborhoods. While this is a prime problem of city temples, he noted, the suburban temples face similar situations. Finally, Dr. Jacobs warned that the exploding scientific and technological forces of American society would in the coming two decades present the religious movement with untold new moral and spiritual problems.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
