"Sons and daughters who studied in Jewish day schools, attended yeshivot and seminaries in Eretz Israel, went to summer camps that were under Orthodox auspices, and participated in other traditional emunah-strengthening, kehilah-building activities."

"Guess Whos Coming to Dinner? were made today, many of my closest friends in the Orthodox community could suggest a new title: Guess Whos Not Coming to Dinner? A Shabbat dinner, in other words."

"His speculation: Kids in essence [are] following their parents own model, namely, the parents changed the life they were brought up in, and now their children do the same. Statistics and several interviews back up this assertion that BT mothers and fathers are disproportionately represented among the Orthodox parents whose children shed an Orthodox lifestyle as they grow older. According to most statistical research and anecdotal reports, people who have come to identify as ex-Orthodox typically began to have doubts about the Orthodox belief and normative behavior system beginning in, or by, their early teens. A time when many adolescents examine what they think and how they act. In other words, though these young Jews bodies were in the Orthodox community, their hearts werent. In other words, they had already begun to emotionally step away from the milieu in which they were raised. In other words, the formal, physical step to leave their home."

"He seriously questioned his relationship with Orthodox Judaism by the time he spent his post-high school gap year at a yeshiva in Israel, but I had my doubts prior to that. I just felt really fake while going through the motions of observance, repeating the same words of prayer every day, accepting claims about the uniqueness of Judaism as the sole source of truth, and about the shortcomings of non-Orthodox branches of the religion. I never felt connected to the demands or exclusivist culture of the Orthodox community. Now he calls himself agnostic more than anything. He says he and his wife, who was raised, and still identifies as, Conservative, will raise their children one already, a second one on the way in the Conservative pipeline: Solomon Schechter Day School, attendance at Conservative synagogues. Their home: not 100% kosher. His wife lights Shabbat candles most weeks; they will conduct a Shabbat meal most Friday evenings. They, Lenik says, are following a com"

"In other words, as Chrysler said, God is not often present to an adequate degree, at least in the Jewish classroom. Or at the Shabbat table."

"One of the people I approached, whom I have known since he was young, was Max Lenik, a project manager in the museum world in Chicago who was raised in an Orthodox family (both parents, notably, are baalei teshuvah) in New York States Rockland County, and has counted himself among the ranks of the formerly Orthodox for more than a decade. He documented his spiritual journey, and that of fellow travelers, from frumkeit non-observant and non-believing in his college thesis.[4]"