Groups Celebrate Seders With a Cause

At Jewish Family Service’s Freedom Seder, participants read
from a haggadah that was just a little bit different. Instead of reading of the
four sons, those at the Freedom Seder read about the “four community members.”

“The wise community member asks, ‘How can we, as
individuals, and a community, address domestic violence?'”

“The wicked community member asks, ‘Why don’t they just
leave?'”

The focus of the Freedom Seder was liberation from domestic
violence, and it was one of several seders in Los Angeles that celebrated not
the exodus from Egypt but liberations of different kinds.

As one of the most elaborate rituals in the Jewish
tradition, many groups have co-opted the seder’s ceremony and traditions to
express their own personal freedoms — be it from violence at the Freedom Seder
or bigotry at the Interfaith Alliance’s Breaking the Silence
Muslim-Jewish-Christian seder. At the Jewish Deaf Community Center’s (JDCC)
10th annual community seder at Temple Adat Ari El, participants celebrated
being able to observe the Jewish tradition in a manner that was accessible to
all.

The Freedom Seder was held March 30 at a secret location. It
was closed to the public to protect the identity of its participants, most of
whom were women, both Jewish and not, who had been or were still in violent
relationships.

The participants took the traditional haggadah and added
their own narratives to it, like the poem, “From Withered to Freedom,” by
Marlys Nunneri, whose husband physically and emotionally abused her for 40
years and in June of 1999 shot her point-blank in the chest. Nunneri, who
survived, wrote:

“My eyes were all red,

My body black and blue.

He would always blame me,

For things I didn’t do.”

“Whether these women are Jewish or non-Jewish, they are all
celebrating the same thing,” said Kitty Glass, JFS’ outreach coordinator, who
was careful to point out that Nunneri’s case was an extreme example of domestic
violence. “They are free from being hostages in their own homes, which is how
many of the women describe it.”

A few days earlier on March 28, Rabbi Steven Jacobs from
Congregation Kol Tivkah; Dr. Nazir Khaja, president of the Islamic Information
Service; the Rev. Ed Bacon, All Saints Church in Pasadena, and Rabbi Joshua
Levine Grater, Pasadena Jewish Temple Center, hosted Breaking the Silence: A
Passover Celebration Seeking Peace and Reconciliation Seder at Kol Tikvah for
members of their respective congregations.

Like the Freedom Seder, Breaking the Silence used a revised
haggadah, one that contained excerpts from the Torah, the Quran and the
Christian Bible. One-hundred-and-eighty participants of different faiths sat
together. The aim of the seder was to show that the message of Passover is one
of reconciliation and peace, and that religion does not have to be governed by
bigoted extremists.

“Tonight’s commemoration of the seder together,” wrote Khaja
in the haggadah, “gives us the unique opportunity to come together, not blinded
by emotions and passions that have kept us divided but truly as a people moving
forward towards liberation from cynicism, mistrust and doubt.”

At the Jewish Deaf Community Center’s seder held on the
second night of Passover, the celebration was on being able to enjoy the
ceremony without the inconvenience caused by disability. The JDCC’s seder was a
multimedia one, with a video service projected onto large screens. The service,
which was hosted by deaf Oscar-winning actress Marlee Matlin, featured
voiceover narration, captions and sign language.

“For years, deaf people have had to look at their haggadah
books and try to follow the leaders or sign-language interpreters,” it says on
JDCC’s Web site. “JDCC decided to develop a user-friendly seder, allowing us to
focus on the screen without having to worry about what page we are on.”

Sharon Ann Dror, president of JDCC, communicating with The
Journal through use of a teletext telephone, said that she developed the seder
because of a lack of religious services for deaf Jews.

“The Americans With Disabilities Act [ADA] provides equal
access for deaf people. For example, at the Mark Taper Forum, they need to show
captioned movies once a week. When my kid takes a class at the park, they need
to find the money for sign-language interpreters. But the Jewish community is
not affected by the ADA, because of the separation of church and state,” Dror
said.

Dror said that she started her organization when she saw the
way her three deaf children were being denied religious education and religious
participation because of a lack of funds.

Religious organizations “complained that there was not
enough money to pay for interpreters, so I decided to solve my own problem and
start my own program,” she said.

For more information about the Family Violence Project, call
(818) 789-1293.

For information about Breaking the Silence, call (818)
358-0670.

For information about Jewish Deaf
Community Center, visit www.jdcc.org
.