Gerut: The Necessity To Think Outside New York

Much has been written about the Rabbinical Council of America's "Gerus Protocols and Standards (GPS)". I have been thinking about it recently while attending the 2nd annual conference of Israeli and Diaspora Rabbis coordinated by Rabbinei Tzohar. I would like to just highlight one area that I find to be particularly problematic. That area being their policies towards the conversion of minors (ger katan).

According to the GPS the parents of an adopted child must commit to the following for the child to be converted under the auspices of the RCA:

... commit to 12 years of Orthodox day school education for that child. The Bet Din should set criteria for what it considers to be schools in which the child will receive a serious Orthodox day school education...

Now, how can any parent living throughout the United States or Canada not in a major Jewish metropolitan area like New York, Chicago, Toronto or Los Angeles possibly send their child to an Orthodox day school? There are very few Orthodox day schools outside of the major areas of Orthodox concentration in North America.

This requirement effectively puts up an iron barrier impenetrable by couples yearning to have a child. The adoption process is a thoroughly complicated and financially burdensome endeavor without this additional requirement which is absolutely unrealistic for anyone living in most of North America.

The geographic impossibility aside, this requirement additionally makes adoption only feasible for the very wealthy. Day school education is quite expensive and 12 years of it could prove impossible for countless couples.

All rabbis interested in the continuity and vitality of the Jewish people are concerned with the education of the next generation. To criticize this requirement is not to say that one does not support Jewish education. It is to say that the realities of Amkha (our people) have to be taken into consideration and one can not decree something which is impossible to implement or maintain.