Why is this seder different from all other seders? Could be the nuns

LUSAKA, Zambia — At first glance, this Passover seder doesn’t seem much different from all other Passover seders: four cups of wine, four questions asked by the youngest in the room, unleavened bread on the table, even a nod to the famous “Dayenu” song that never seems to end.

But this night is different from all other nights: Most noticeably, all the participants of the seder are wearing veils and habits.

The seder is part of a four-decade-old tradition by Catholic nuns, who gather from across central Africa at the Kalundu Study Center in Lusaka for a Passover seder — closely heeding to the Jewish traditions — a few days before the real thing.

And these sisters are not alone: Catholic nuns, also called sisters, celebrate seder services each year across the world on Holy Thursday, three days before Easter.

“The seder is something new for us, which brings the theological understanding from Passover to the Eucharist,” said Sister Euphrasia Chanda, the director of the study course at Kalundu.

In the story of Jesus’ crucifixion, the Last Supper is widely interpreted as being a Passover seder. The tradition of the Eucharist, eating the host, began at the Last Supper.

“I first participated in a seder 30 years ago in England,” said Sister Leila O’Shea, who is originally from Ireland but has spent 20 years in Zambia. “It helps us to understand how Jews celebrate, and how the Easter celebration is a part of that,” she explained.

All sorts of Catholics celebrate seders to gain deeper understanding of Easter, but nuns are especially fond of the practice. They often hold a seder for sisters-in-training, called novitiates.

There are many resources for Christians who want to celebrate a seder, especially those that combine the ancient story of the liberation of the slaves from Egypt with issues of modern slavery such as human trafficking, which is widespread in central Africa.

The seder is not a tradition celebrated annually, like other aspects of Easter, but is used more as a teaching opportunity.

At the Kalundu Center, the sisters have been celebrating a seder every year since 1974 with participants on the year-long course for formators — the sisters who train novitiates.

Many of the participants say the seder is one of their most meaningful experiences, said Chanda — the director of the formators course — who can still remember her first seder in 1983. Since she became director in 2010, she’s been in charge of making the beet-and-raisin haroset, the traditional mixture representing mortar that the Israelites used during slavery.

For the bitter herb, they use a locally grown vegetable known as “chiconya,” which has a bitter taste.

The seder tradition comes in the midst of Holy Week, a spiritually elevated period during the week preceding Easter. Participating in a ritual meal is a tangible way for the participants to feel closer to the story of Jesus and the roots of Christianity. And they stick to the same service that Jews use — asking the Four Questions, roasting an egg, telling the story of the Exodus, and remembering the Ten Plagues.

Embracing the Jewish seder over the past decades has been part of the Church’s long shift away from blaming Jews for the death of Jesus and towards finding meaning in the traditions of the precursor to Christianity.

“There is more of a realization of looking at things that unite us and not things that divide us,” said Sr Florence Muuka. “We used to say a prayer for the conversion of all, but we stopped doing that.”

“Now, it’s more about seeing [Judaism] as the ancestor of Catholicism,” added O’Shea.

The sisters make the matzah by hand, using very hot water and flour, just the way the ancient Israelites made it.

But the sisters were also thrilled to try Israeli store-bought matzah, which I threw into my backpack at the last minute.

I was in Zambia for a reporting trip for Global Sisters Report, a website about Catholic sisters where I am the Middle East and Africa correspondent.

I originally packed the matzah to take to the Jewish community in Zambia (a story soon to be published in these pages), but I thought I’d give some to the sisters to explain a little about Passover as a cultural gesture.

I was surprised when they told me they’d been hosting Passover seders for decades at Kalundu, and asked me for my family’s recipe for haroset.

“For us Catholics, it is about the spiritual transformation,” explained Chanda. “The Passover meal is part of the Old Covenant, and you’re still keeping it to recall how the Israelites were saved. For us, it’s a New Covenant, not just about the liberation, but about the transformation and our redemption.”

It makes me smile to know that the night before I sit down to this Passover meal with my family, at the table laden with our own traditional fare, Catholic sisters will be holding up three pieces of matzah and telling the same story.

Despite a penchant for travel, I don’t think I ever could have imagined that one day I would find myself making fried matzah (matzah brei) in a convent in Zambia under a crucifix.

I put in extra salt, just the way my non-Jewish friends used to request during midnight munchie sessions in college.

Because there is one thing about Passover that didn’t surprise me in the least: Nuns love fried matzah.