Sharing our Torah is co-led by
Kohenet Keshira haLev Fife and Rabbi Sass Brown.
This monthly sit is co-sponsored by Ammud: The Jews of Color Torah Academy.
Wednesdays, 12:00 – 1:00 PM ET
2026: July 1, August 12, Sept 2, Oct 14, Nov 11, Dec 16
2027: January 6, February 10, March 10, April 14, May 5, June 9
Mindful Jewish Ritual for Our Times
When the world around us feels volatile, we can use mindful Jewish rituals to build moments of stability and rest, expanding our awareness and returning to a centered state. We invite Jews of Color to join us for a monthly opportunity to slow down together and practice ritual tools for spiritual nourishment.
Each month, a JOC leader will lead one mindful Jewish ritual for our times, bringing together the richness of Jewish practice and the beauty of our diverse lineages. This JOC-led space is one part inspiration, one part meditation, one part community connection! Co-led by Kohenet Keshira haLev Fife, IJS Core Faculty, and Rabbi Sass Brown, Program Director at Ammud: The Jews of Color Torah Academy, with guest JOC leaders.
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Please read and familiarize yourself with the “Making Safer Spaces” guidelines. For spiritual practice to be truly transformative, it’s essential to be part of a sacred community of intention striving for safety, whether in-person or online. These guidelines can help us create this community.
This community of practice is intended only for members of the JoCSM community. If you are not a member of this community, please sign up for and feel welcome to join future sit intensives for an open audience.
This community of practice is an affinity space for members of the JoC community. All who identify as Jews of Color, including Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews, are welcome to join and share from our diverse lineages in this space. If you are not a member of this community, please sign up for our Daily Online Meditation Sit and feel welcome to join future programs for an open audience. More questions about the term JoC? Check out Ammud’s FAQs here.
Kohenet Keshira haLev Fife (she/they) sprinkles sparkles, disrupts expectations, and offers blessings wherever she goes. She serves as Founding Kohenet of Kesher Pittsburgh and is a Core Faculty Member with the Institute for Jewish Spirituality; she also enjoys working with Jewish Studio Project and Kirva among other national Jewish organisations. Additionally, she delights in serving as a facilitator, teacher, life spiral ceremony/ritual creatrix, shlichat tzibbur, liturgist and songstress. Her work in these realms is informed by her lived experience as a queer, bi-racial, child-free Jewish person living with chronic illness, her belief that Book, Body and Earth are equal sources of wisdom, the quandaries she has encountered as a scholar of the Orphan Wisdom School, and her deep commitment to a thriving, liberatory Jewish future. Keshira received Kohenet smicha in 2017 and earned her BS (2000) and MS (2001) at Carnegie Mellon University. Though both the lands of the Osage & Haudenosaunee people (aka Pittsburgh, PA) and the Gadigal people (Sydney, AUS) feel like home, Keshira and her beloved have been in an extended period of travel since January 2023.
Rabbi Sassoon Brown wants Jews and their loved ones to feel that they are inheritors of Torah, stories, poetry, and music that they can use to experience and express their spirituality. Rabbi Sass teaches with a strong sense of identity and ancestry, and believes Torah is enriched when interpreted through the many cultures and backgrounds that make up Jewish community.
Rabbi Sass was ordained at the Jewish Theological Seminary in 2025, where they were a Wexner Graduate Fellow and Crown Fellow. They hold an MA in Spiritual Care and Counseling (JTS), an MFA in Creative Writing (NCSU), and BA in Communications (UNC Chapel Hill). Before rabbinical school, Rabbi Sass worked running programs for Beth Meyer Synagogue and Camp JCC in Raleigh, NC. While at JTS, they worked as a rabbinic intern for USY, The Emanuel Synagogue, Ft. Tryon Jewish Center, and Ammud. They also worked as a chaplain intern supporting older adults at the New Jewish Home, people exiting incarceration through the Fortune Society, and the trauma and surgery department at UNC Hospitals. Rabbi Sass once wrote a book of queer Jewish poetry, The Shortest Skirt in Shul, which is available through Ben Yehuda Press. They currently live in Raleigh, NC.