Anyone's Church Having a Sader Dinner?

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Deacon_Tony560

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Some churches have this dinner as a sign of fellowship with our Jewish brothers and sisters. Has anyone done this or is anyone planning this?

Deacon Tony
 
how are we supposed to have a fellowship when the 2 religions have such different beliefs? jews think jesus was crazy!
 
Deacon Tony560:
Some churches have this dinner as a sign of fellowship with our Jewish brothers and sisters. Has anyone done this or is anyone planning this?

Deacon Tony
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No, but my Mom teaches CCD and does a Seder meal to teach about the Last Supper and Passover with her little pupils:D its very cool.
 
We have one each year as a teaching device to help all better understand the Jewish roots of the mass.

We had a Jewish convert in RCIA a couple of years ago, and now on the RCIA team. He is helping them keep it accurate.
 
When I was young and went to Catholic School, we had a Seder Meal every year. I even remember doing it with my grandmother.
 
Joe Kelley:
We have one each year as a teaching device to help all better understand the Jewish roots of the mass.

We had a Jewish convert in RCIA a couple of years ago, and now on the RCIA team. He is helping them keep it accurate.
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You are very lucky. What a great idea! Was it started by the pastor?
Deacon Tony
 
We’ve had one the past couple of years during Holy Week. I thought they were pretty cool - an interesting way of understanding a small piece of the Jewish roots of our faith. This year though, since Easter is so much earlier than Passover, the seder is not being held during Holy Week. I think they plan to hold it on or near the actual Passover.

I wish they had kept it during Holy Week since it actually contributed quite positively to my Holy Week reflections. Besides, we weren’t doing it because we wanted to participate in a Jewish holiday, we were doing it to add some deeper significance and appreciation to the last supper. That’s why I liked the Holy Week timing better.

Either way though, it was an interesting event and I think the people from our parish who participated found it to be a positive experience. In our parish, it started as an initiative our our youth ministry group.

The food wasn’t very exciting though 😉 But I guess that’s the whole idea.
 
Deacon Tony560:
You are very lucky. What a great idea! Was it started by the pastor?
Deacon Tony
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No - by the Knights of Columbus. With the pastor’s enthusiastic approval. We had a very good pastor at the time. He strongly supported any good ideas - with words. He had more than enough to keep him busy [2 priests for 3500 families, seven Sunday masses] ; so was grateful for things that did not call on his time.

We also got good support from the Religious Education people.
 
Joe Kelley:
No - by the Knights of Columbus. With the pastor’s enthusiastic approval. We had a very good pastor at the time. He strongly supported any good ideas - with words. He had more than enough to keep him busy [2 priests for 3500 families, seven Sunday masses] ; so was grateful for things that did not call on his time.

We also got good support from the Religious Education people.
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We love those Knights out here. They send us good Catholic material for our prisons, free of charge,
 
We have a Seder Supper every year to celebrate our Jewish roots.
Ours will be held on 3-21 this year
 
We had a pastor a few years ago that held a seder every year on the Wednesday of Holy Week. The last year he was here, we had one in the afternoon for all the school children. The school let them watch “Prince of Egypt” before hand and reviewed the the story of the Exodus so they were ready.

I greatly enjoyed the Seder. We would start assembling in the church to read the gospel story where Jesus says he “very much” wants to celebrate passover and sends some of the apostles to make arrangements for a room. Then we would go to our church hall for the meal complete with all the symbols and prayers. In the introduction, our pastor commented that he was “40 yers a priest” and never really understood the mystery of the mass until he attended a Jewish Seder.

The seder includes several blessings using wine and unleavened bread. At the end of the Seder, our pastor said that on Holy Thursday night, Jesus stunned the apostles by going one step further. He took the bread and wine that were already on the table and already a symbol of bringing God’s people out of slavery to the promised land, out of darkness into light, and he blessed them in the ritual that all of us know so well. In doing so, he made the passover his own - passing from death into life.

There are resources available on holding a seder - some specific to holding a seder with Christians. Enjoy.

Patrick
 
My wife and I just found a handout in an old cookbook from the first Catholic school my daughter went to.

It was comparing the Sader and Easter as nearly identical. There was alot I didn’t agree with in the context.

Is there any Catholic teaching comparing the 2?
 
Our Church has hosted a Seder for the last few years, put on by our youth group. The food is mostly donated and they charge ten bucks a seat and use the money to send our kids to Catholic youth day. The Seder meal is a wonderful experience and I do it every year, it is money well spent. I’ve never seen Catholics as seperate from the Jewish faith, but a continuation. The Seder is great Old Testament teaching.
 
Don’t catholics have the sader dinner every time we have mass? Or am I confusing that something else?
 
Don’t catholics have the sader dinner every time we have mass? Or am I confusing that something else?
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In a very loose sense, yes. When we celebrate the Mass we are commemorating, and participating in, an event that took place at a particular Seder meal. A proper Seder meal, however, has a lot of elements, including specific foods and readings from Exodus.
 
I would never introduce the celebration of a complete seder meal in the parish because it is so offensive to our Jewish neighbors and often perceived as a mockery of their holy day. they ask how we would feel if the did a mock Mass in their children’s religion class. What we do in CCD is to explain the elements of the Passover meal, in the context of the Exodus story, with excerpts and translations of some of the prayers and blessings. then we put the Last Supper in the context of the Passover meal, which it was, including the imporant and overlooked part where earlier in the day Jesus instructs two apostles to prepare for the Passover supper. The preparation for Passover is extremely important to the Jewish context of the meal, the holy day, and the events of the Triduum.
 
In my home parish we have never had a Sader Meal. However, the area has no Jewish people, being predominantly Irish Catholic with some Muslims the other side of the city. I imagine the reason why is because without authentic Jewish teaching, it could be (mis)construed as offensive as noted by puzzleannie.

If it was done correctly, I am sure there is no harm, however I have never seen one offered (I will check out my local Parish and the Cathedral, however). How would I know if it was resepctful and true to Jewish teachings?
 
I am an elderly Catholic who had never heard of a Sader Dinner until I read this thread. I would imagine that it is not necessary to Catholic Faith. Or maybe we in this town have been missing something for decades and decades.
 
I’ve never heard any Jews complain about us celebrating a Seder. I know Conservative Jews who come to participate, in fact. It’s hardly mocking considering the fact that it’s a celebration of the exact same thing, and it’s a part of OUR faith as well (we do have Exodus in our Scriptures, and the Apostles celebrated the Seder).

The Mass is different because it’s not a part of the Jewish faith in any way. If those individuals can’t accept the fact that the Seder meal IS a part of ours, albeit one that’s been ignored for some time, then there’s not much that can be done for them. Assure them that it’s not intended to mock, and explain that the founders of the Church, and the early Christians celebrated the Seder as well. Beyond that there’s nothing that can be said. I certainly wouldn’t give up the Seder, our Lord’s Last Supper, because someone complained.
 
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