Customer Reviews

Come to the Table: A Catholic Passover Seder for Holy Week

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During this Year of the Eucharist, Catholics looking to more fully appreciate the sacrament while enriching their family or parish celebration of Holy Week should look to the wonderful new book Come to the Table: A Catholic Passover Seder for Holy Week (Plowshares Publishing, January 2005, paperback, 96 pages). Author Meredith Gould, Ph.D., writes from an educated perspective - describing herself as a "Jew by identity, a Christian by faith, and a Catholic in practice". Gould's additional books include The Catholic Home: Celebrations and Traditions for Holidays, Feast Days and Everyday (Doubleday), which carries the imprimatur of the Catholic Church. As an adult convert to Catholicism, she writes in a manner which will encourage Catholics to examine and embrace the richness of traditional Jewish rituals and symbolism surrounding the feast of Passover.

Having been raised in a Jewish home, Gould opens her book with reminiscences of family Passover celebrations. With many Jewish friends of my own, I have discussed the wonderful family gatherings of this holiday and the memories created through the act of coming together in faith and celebration. I am looking forward to sharing Meredith Gould's Catholic Passover Seder with my own family and friends this year as a part of our Holy Week celebration.

As background information, Gould supplies a history of the rituals and symbols of the traditional Passover feast. An informative and touching section of the book entitled "Reconciliation and Teshuva" comments on the evolving relationship between Jews and Catholics, up to an including recent Papal acts and writings and current events such as reaction to Mel Gibson's film The Passion of the Christ. Given this background, Gould recommends an emphasis on what we as Catholics share in common with our Jewish brethren. The Catholic Passover Seder does not draw entirely on the traditional Jewish Seder, but rather provides an alternative inspired by and structured upon the original format but based in Christianity.

The bulk of Come to the Table contains practical, step by step instructions for planning, preparing and conducting your own Catholic Passover Seder. Gould's Seder may be used in either home, small group or parish settings. A complete appendix section provides additional prescriptions for carrying out a successful Seder in your parish.

I walked away from my experience of reading Come to the Table: A Catholic Passover Seder for Holy Week both educated and inspired: educated on this history, symbols and rituals which underpin this antecedent to our Holy Thursday Eucharistic traditions, and inspired to celebrate this new tradition in my own home and faith community.

I found Meredith Gould's book to be extremely helpful in planning our Seder this year. Last year we used a "Christian" version of the traditional Seder Supper but it really did not bring Jesus, Our Lord into the celebration. Ms. Gould's book really takes the Catholic perspective of this Jewish Tradition and blends it beautifully, using the Gospels as a basis. I am really looking forward to celebrating it with the Passion and Resurection in mind. I highly recommend it.

I learned a great deal about Passover, the celebration of Seder and its relation to Holy Week from this book. The author presented the material in an interesting manner, with a spiritual message that is ageless. I reread parts of the book three times and thoroughly enjoyed expanding my knowledge and worldview in the process. What is so special about this book, however, is that it enriched my appreciation, as a Catholic, of this holy time of the year. The book also includes all of the information necessary for your family, or a group as large as your parish, to celebrate a Catholic Passover Seder , right down to the necessary preparations. Highly recommended for church groups, pastors, youth leaders, individuals and spiritual seekers of all kinds.

Learn about Passover Seder and Holly Week. A wonderful way to bring Jews and Catholics together to share some seemingly uncommon rituals. At the very least, this book is food for thought.

I bought this book, hoping to find in it a seder that incorporated the rich traditions of both Judaism and Catholicism. I unfortunately did not find what I had hoped. The seder and explanations contained herein seemed to in many cases diminish the significance of the Jewish celebration of Passover and not sufficiently detail the continuity of the last seder of Jesus with the celebration of the Mass and Catholicism and its development. I would not recommend this book to anyone who did not have a thorough familiarity with and appreciation for the Jewish traditions. My husband, who is Jewish, and I (Catholic) ended up writing our own seder for my parish seder. The thirst from the group we celebrated with was for authentic Judaism in the context of Catholicism. Despite my high hopes, I did not find this in this book and could not in good conscience recommend its use.