Does Canadian Jewry have a unique character as opposed to American Jewry?
Rabbi Leigh Lerner, Temple Emanu-El-Beth Sholom, Montreal, Quebec: Yes, the Jews of Canada possess distinct differences from their U.S. counterparts. Of the 370,000 Canadian Jews, a goodly number stem from the 40,000 survivors of the Holocaust that Canada received at the end of the war. For that reason, Holocaust consciousness runs higher in Canada than in the United States. Zionism, too, is stronger. Canadian Jews are twice as likely as American Jews to have visited Israel. In addition, Canada experienced little organizational influence from the mid-nineteenth century wave of German-speaking Jewish immigrants who founded Reform Judaism in the U.S. Rather, traditionalist, Yiddishist, and even Chasidic influences have prevailed north of the border. Today, for example, Reform Jewry comprises only an estimated 6% of affiliated Jews and 3% of all Jews in Montreal, where various types of Orthodoxy form the religious majority. About 50% of Jewish elementary-age children attend Jewish day sch
