Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice

Articles written by Abigail Pickus


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  • Armed with soap, Jewish teen targets disease and poverty in the Third World

    Abigail Pickus|Aug 25, 2017

    Sydney Kamen has always been concerned with helping others. In 2004, when genocide was raging in the Darfur region of Sudan, Kamen's mother announced that instead of Hanukkah gifts that year, Kamen and her sister should research and select a charity to support. At Jewish religious school on Sundays, Kamen went on service trips to soup kitchens, and through Georgetown Day School, he spent time at a women's shelter in downtown Washington, D.C. Her first experience with aid work in a developing...

  • Rebbetzin 2.0: With co-equal role, young Orthodox women breaking mold of 'rabbi's wife'

    Abigail Pickus|Apr 28, 2017

    CHICAGO-Every Friday morning for a month, rebbetzin Ariel Pardo has been meeting with three female Jewish students at Brandeis University for deep conversations that wind their way from Jewish ritual to intimacy. "Ari is always so open and she makes us feel so comfortable," said Mollie Goldfarb, 19, a first-year student. "She gives off that warm, inviting presence everyone can be around. It's never just her teaching us, but us learning and discussing together." Pardo and her husband, Rabbi...

  • Miracle drug with Israeli roots saves Jewish hockey player hit with cancer

    Abigail Pickus|Mar 24, 2017

    CHICAGO-Hockey had been the focal point of Sam Fields' life for almost as long as he can remember. A Chicago native who got into the sport at the age of eight, Fields had been playing professional hockey for about five years when he was tapped for a tryout with the National Hockey League. At the age of 27, he was on the cusp of becoming one of a handful of Jews in the NHL. But just weeks before he was to head off to NHL training camp, Fields could barely rouse himself from bed. He was sleeping...

  • New advocacy push delivering hundreds of millions in gov't money to Jewish schools

    Abigail Pickus|Feb 3, 2017

    Being an Orthodox Jew can cost a pretty penny. There are the premium prices for kosher meat, the two sets of dishes, the mikvah fees. There are expensive lifecycle celebrations like brises and bar mitzvahs, and requisite accessories like tefillin ($1,000). The Jewish holidays have expenses all their own: sukkahs, shmura matzah, big holiday meals with lots of guests-to say nothing of the cost of using up vacation days for the Jewish holy days. Then there are the big-ticket items, like real...