Yichusdik – That is a very controversial approach and there are many (if not most or all) who disagree.
I listened to a tape by Rav Orlofsky years ago on the perils of doing kiruv. It was a long time ago so I hope I am not inadvertantly quoting the wrong person, but I am pretty sure that he is the one who pointed out that one should not do kiruv if it will harm the person doing kiruv’s own spiritual growth.
To the argument, “But we have to! There’s a fire out there!”, his response was, “Do you believe in Hashem?”
We have to have bitachon in Hashem that He runs the world and we are not in control. We do not and can not make people Frum. All we can do is to do our hishtadlus which means only doing that hishtadlus which is appropriate and does not run counter to Torah hashkafa. One is not allowed to do kiruv if he is not strong enough to know that he will not be influenced. One is also not allowed to do kiruv if he is not yet strong enough to give things over properly.
I happen to think that a lot of people who are doing kiruv are doing more harm than good. If someone’s hashkafa is not what it should be and they are mekarev people to be “frum” the way that they are “Frum” and they gave over an improper view of what Yiddishkeit is, they may be doing more harm than good.
I just reread your post as I was typing mine and I see that you wrote:
“And she certainly has to achieve a level of maturity to be able to convey a firm 360 degree commitment if that’s what she is portraying to this individual.”
That is precisely the issue here.
I just realized that you probably don’t understand why I told Rebshidduch what I did. It was not based on the fact that she didn’t know what to do when her student didn’t call her back. It had abosolutely NOTHING to do with that!!! It had to do with other things that I know about Rebshidduch from other threads, as well as a particular comment she made on this thread that referred to things from other threads.
Even though I started out this post by stating that your approach is very controversial, I realize now that it is possible that we don’t have a fundamental disagreement but rather a different understanding of this situation. I am going to leave the beginning of this post anyhow because: a) It could be that I was right in the first place and there was a fundamental disagreement and b) there may be others who understand your post that way, and I think that this is a very important point that MUST be emphasized.
“I was zocheh to meet Rav Noach Weinberg, zt’l a number of times. He once told me that once someone, even the most beginning baal tshuva, has learned and internalized even one mitzvah, he or she has a responsibility to share it with others to the best of their ability. If that means by example, so be it.”
That is not the way that Rebshidduch was using the term “kiruv”. There may be many ways one can use the term, but when speaking to someone who understands a term a certain way, you must use the term in the same way or you will be misunderstood. That is why I told her that she should not be doing kiruv.