Painful Questions and Unconditional Love: Orthodox Parents and Their LGBTQ Children, Part Two - with Rabbi Menachem Penner and Rabbi Yakov Horowitz (270)

November 24, 2025

AI Summary

5 min read

Painful Questions and Unconditional Love: Orthodox Parents and Their LGBTQ Children

When Rabbi Menachem Penner's son Gadalia came out at age fifteen, the family had no one to turn to. For five years, they navigated alone. Penner was then dean of Yeshiva University's rabbinical seminary and a pulpit rabbi in Queens—a public figure in centrist Orthodoxy whose son sometimes visited his office in a tank top with long hair. "It was my problem," Penner says now. "He was being him, and I had to grow to realize that's my son, and I do love him, and I want him here no matter how he's gonna come to my office."

That five-year silence became the catalyst for Kesher Families, the organization Penner and his wife Adina founded to support Orthodox parents of LGBTQ children. The organization now serves some 300 families, offering peer support, guidance, and a Shabbaton where parents can speak without having to explain themselves. As Penner puts it: "Imagine what our lives would have been like if we had someone to speak to in three days instead of five years."

The First Moments After a Child Comes Out

Continue reading the full summary in the app — free to try.

Read Full Summary →

Free • No credit card required

Listen to Audio Summary Open in App

Never miss an episode of Orthodox Conundrum

Get every new episode summarized in your inbox — free, ~5 minutes to read.

No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.

What you'll learn

1 Orthodox Conundrum: Painful Questions and Unconditional Love, Part Two
2 (01:54) **Why Rabbi Penner and Adina Founded Kesher Families** - The volume of parents reaching out became overwhelming after their son came out
3 (11:22) **The Irreplaceable Role of a Parent** - Why keeping the relationship with a child matters more than any public role
4 (13:22) **How a Gay Child Differs from a Child "Going Off the Derech"** - The unique challenge of children who want to remain fully observant in every other area
5 (17:07) **The Decision to Go Public** - Why the Penners chose to share their family story despite criticism
6 (19:58) **Key Lessons for Parents Beyond Love and Acceptance** - Three principles the Penners stress to every parent who reaches out
7 (24:08) **The Overwhelmingly Positive Response to the First Episode** - Rabbi Horowitz on the feedback and its impact

+ Full timestamped outline available in the app

Guests on this episode

Rabbi Yakov Horowitz

Show Notes

Back in August, I released a conversation with Rabbi Yakov Horowitz about Orthodox parents whose children come out as LGBTQ. The feedback to that episode was intense. Some listeners wrote that they finally felt seen. Others said that they were deeply uncomfortable. Quite a few parents asked what they should actually do when their son or daughter comes out to them, and how they can respond with genuine love while remaining faithful to halacha.

Those questions are not theoretical. They are deeply personal, and they are coming from people who keep Shabbat, send their kids to day schools, sit in our shuls, and are trying to raise their families as loyal Torah Jews. Ignoring them does not make them go away.

Today I am speaking with two people who have decided not to look away. Rabbi Menachem Penner is the former dean of RIETS and currently serves as the executive vice president of the Rabbinical Council of America. Together with his wife Adeena he founded Kesher Families, an organization that supports Orthodox parents of LGBTQ children. Rabbi Yakov Horowitz is the founder of Project YES and a co leader of Kesher Families, and he joined me for that earlier conversation.

In this episode we talk about what moved the Penners to start Kesher Families, what it was like for Rabbi Penner to be a very public rabbinic figure when his son came out, and why they chose to share their family story with the broader community. We discuss the first things a parent should and should not say when a child comes out, the confusion that many young people feel as they try to understand their own sexual identity, and how parents can balance acceptance of what a child is telling them with the awareness that some parts of the story may still be unfolding.

We also look at how attitudes in the Orthodox world have changed over the past decade, what has improved, what remains painful, and whether it is really possible to increase compassion and understanding without abandoning our mesorah. And finally, I ask both of my guests what single message they most want the Orthodox community to hear about LGBTQ children and their families.

To learn more about all that Dreamearly does, go to https://dreamearly.co/. Make sure to check out the excellent recent episode of the Stream of Dreamearly Podcast with Dr. David Rosmarin.

To contact Kesher Families, click here.

Follow Rabbi Yakov Horowitz on Instagram - @ya