(RNS) — A New Yorker cartoon has lived rent-free in my head for years. In it, some kids are playing in a progressive early childhood center. One kid looks to the teacher and asks: “Do we still have to do what we want to do?” Today, that cartoon is Reform Judaism’s portrait in miniature. I was in New York City for the Re-CHARGING Reform Judaism gathering last week at Stephen Wise Free Synagogue. The event was spearheaded by the synagogue’s senior rabbi, Ammiel Hirsch. Rabbi Hirsch is one of Reform Judaism’s most prophetic voices. He has spent years naming what many in our movement would rather not hear: that Reform Judaism has drifted from its Zionist commitments, and that it has shifted too much weight from the particular to the universal. (Check out his impassioned keynote on these themes.) Full disclosure: I’ve been active in Amplify Israel, the Stephen Wise initiative that sponsored this conference, and I was one of the planners. This has been my battle, too. And hardly just mine — more than …