By Abby Patkin
Jewish and Christian members of the South community said they gear up every year for Passover and Easter respectively, two religious holidays celebrated widely in the Newton community, by sticking with traditions passed down through multiple generations and even inventing some of their own–whether that includes creative decorating with colorful plastic eggs or crafting a Matzah pizza.
Shauna Pellauer, English teacher:
“Sometimes it feels weird to me that I’m celebrating the cultural aspects of Easter with my daughter [Sadie] but not the religious aspects, but I suppose that will come in time, but a good Easter egg hunt is still a lot of fun!”
What does Easter mean to you?
“[Easter] is the preeminent event of the Christian calendar. The whole year is moving towards [Easter] in many ways… It’s the second bookend, so where Christmas represents the first bookend—God being made flesh in Jesus—and on the other side of the Easter bookend is that God promises creation, that God will never leave, and that death isn’t the final word, so the resurrection represents that…constant divine presence in daily life, ideally.”
How will you observe Easter this year?
“It’s funny because I would love to go to church, but with a two-year-old [child] it’s hard to focus and the church we’ve gone to doesn’t have childcare for that early age, so we’re going to celebrate at home, and have some friends over for brunch, and do the cultural Easter celebrations of Easter egg hunts and all that, but hopefully in time we’ll go to church.”
What traditions have you continued throughout the years?
“I always dyed Easter eggs with my mom, so this was the first year I started with my daughter, and that was pretty fun, every year we would always get gifts for Easter—Easter baskets—and this sense of feeling as if you need to wear a dress on Easter and kind of celebrate Spring, and so I guess that’s kind of it. There’s not so many traditions attached to it yet, though I suppose there is one more. My mom sent me Easter cookies—little sugar cookies—cut out in Easter shapes, so my mom is still bringing the traditions to me.”
What’s one thing you look forward to each year?
“I like the promise of renewal that it represents. I like that at least in the Northern hemisphere it suggests an eventual coming of spring, which in New England, it would really be nice to have some spring. And I appreciate that it draws my attention to the movement of the Christian calendar, because it’s pretty easy to forget about it in daily life.”
Nathan Foster, junior:
What does Passover mean to you?
“For me, Passover is primarily a time to see friends and family at seders*.”
How did you observe Passover this year?
“I observed Passover this year by going to a seder at my grandparents’ house the night before Passover with a bunch of my family, then hosting two seders at my house. I’m also keeping kosher for Passover.”
What traditions have you continued throughout the years?
“The seder at my grandparents’ house and the two seders at my house have gone on for years; keeping kosher for Passover is also a tradition.”
What’s one thing you look forward to each year?
“Seders, and seeing family, including my cousins who live in Maryland. Not Matzah.”
*(Seders are Jewish ritual feasts for the beginning of Passover)
