As I begin my role as Interim Executive Director of the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance (Jofa), I have been thinking a lot about connection. About how holiness is built not only through grand visions or towering ideals, but through the often-unseen points where people meet, hold one another up, and choose to belong.

This past Shabbat, I attended the bat mitzvah of family friends and was deeply moved by the sermon delivered by Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove. He drew our attention to one of the most easily overlooked details of the Mishkan, the desert Tabernacle. Not the gold. Not the artistry. Not the sweeping symbolism. But the adanim, the sockets.

These sockets are mentioned more than one hundred times in the Torah. They are the bases that hold everything together: joining wood to metal, beam to curtain, board to board. Each socket was cast from the same half-shekel contributed by every Israelite, equal in measure, equal in purpose. The Torah’s message is........

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