Passover: A Hotbed of Social Justice Activity

As Passover approaches, my in-box seems to be full of social justice themed e-mails (perhaps this is more a statement about my e-mail processing skills but let's pretend it is purely because of the fact that Passover is just such a good platform for social justice advocacy efforts).

One recent message contained a link to a Seder supplement written by my friend Elissa F. highlighting the National Council of Jewish Women's work with the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) through their Progress by Pesach campaign (extra points for HIAS because their campaign's name is alliterative) for comprehensive immigration reform.

Another e-mail contained an invitation from the same socially conscience Elissa F. to attend the Jews United for Justice (JUFJ) annual Labor Seder (Elissa is a board member of JUFJ). EDITORIAL NOTE: Are we noticing a theme here? Lots of Jewish organizations with lots of acronyms...doing lots of important progressive work...with the help of Elissa F. Wahoo! So I decided to attend the Labor Seder on Tuesday night with friends Tovah P., Meredith S. H., and Adam G. (I believe this is Adam's debut on W and CP, welcome Adam) and we had a lovely time! This year's theme was advocacy for day laborers--a topic I knew very little about. Check out JUFJ's website to learn more about the campaign to help day laborers (and see a few photos I took at the event posted there, too).

Photographing the JUFJ Seder was easy and fun because there were so many moments when people were clapping or doing an activity while seated. Thanks to Susan S. (my photo blog inspiration) for teaching me the the possibilities associated with clapping photo subjects! Here are a few of my other favorites from the night:

While we're on the topic of left leaning passover resources, I dug up some themed Goodstein family haggadot of Passovers past (please note the use of a plural Hebrew word, thank you very much) and uploaded them as Google Docs. (If you are hosting or participating in a Seder next week, download and enjoy or just brush up on your Goodstein family institutional knowledge and wow me next time I see you)...Or check out the progressive social justice themed haggadah to end all other progressive social justice themed haggadot, The Love and Justice Haggadah (featuring a story by Stosh Cotler of Selah fame)!