PASSOVER by Aileen Fisher

The festival of freedom
comes happily in spring;
freedom for a people
and every living thing.

Freedom from a bitter
bondage, long,long ago;
freedom from the bondage
of winter's ice and snow.

Passover is the very old Jewish holiday which comes in the spring, celebrating the exodus of the Jews from Egypt; a seder is a ritual feast for Passover, held in Jewish communities or families when the story of the Exodus is retold annually through everyone reading a special text called a "Haggadah" together.  The word "seder" literally means "order" and there is a specific order of readings and symbolic foods which are eaten by the participants followed by a more general big meal.
I grew up with almost no contact with Judaism, and knew very little about the traditions of my Jewish friends in college.  My first Passover seders were called "liberation seders" and were moving, learning-filled events during the 70s, held by the Toronto co-counseling community.  That peer-based movement focused on people helping one another to heal from both specific, individual hurts and from societal oppressions, such as anti-Semitism.  I was inspired to learn how the liberation of any one group is essential for the well-being of all humanity.  Listening to the Hebrew prayers and songs in the Haggadah, I also found the seder very beautiful. Talking with friends who were Jewish and others who were allies of Jews, I gained many insights into the riches and biases of the Jewish religion and culture, and came to understand many aspects of Jewish life.  And on the very simplest level of shared food, I came to relish the "charoses" mixture of ground walnuts and grated apple, eaten with the unleavened bread, or matzoh that characterizes the holiday, along with horseradish for "spice."
Because seders include specific roles for children old enough to read and ask significant questions about the steps of the ritual, there are also some activities to engage children, such as searching for the special piece of matzoh called the "afikomen." In the mid-1980s my family had the unique opportunity to attend a family seder in Jerusalem, conducted according to Sephardic Jewish guidelines, and I remember the children getting more and more heavy-eyed as the night wore on --we parents were tired, too, by the late hour that we drove home.  Our seder this year at the Unitarian church will probably use a shorter Haggadah, and it definitely won't be as long an evening as ours was in Jerusalem, but the food will be delicious, the songs fervent, and the group sense of gratitude for our freedom today will be tangible.