Passover 2017 Seder Supplement

As Passover approaches, I’ve been thinking about the reasons why I’m a religious Jew, sparked significantly by a recent Reconstructionist pilgrimage to civil rights sites in the south. I’m wrestling with how to incorporate this powerful, painful and staggering experience into our celebration of freedom, in a way that respects the experiences of Black people—and Black Jews.

You could say that Jackie Land has been on the ground floor of change within the Reconstructionist movement of Judaism. For one, it’s in her blood — quite literally.

The synagogue emerged as an offshoot of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. But in 1989, it separated itself from the college to show that the new denomination could survive.