Here we are, Black American church folk and Shabbat observing Jews. We are the children of those who suffered in the sweltering house of bondage. And many of us have become Pharaohs.

Miriam played an integral role in the story of Exodus, yet she's all but ignored during Passover, the holiday that commemorates the Exodus. It's not surprising.

Just as the Seder and Haggadah have evolved over the centuries, they have evolved in our home as we use a series of symbolic items to tell the story of the human desire for freedom, not just freedom for Jews, and the need to challenge oppression by any and all.

While we're busy navigating our ways around aluminum-clad kitchens, taped up cabinets containing chometz, all the while popping lady fingers and peeling vegetables, it's easy to forget why we celebrate the holiday altogether. I'm here to assure you, the story of Passover doesn't need to be complicated.

LaPierre does have a point. We do need to address the way our culture glorifies violence. But the priority must be to stop the bleeding.

To get to the mountaintop so stirringly glimpsed by Dr. King in his last days, he had to speak plainly about divisions, not shy away from pointing out disparities and not be afraid to disturb the status quo.

Inspired by the first parsha of the new year, Shemot, I aspire this year to give a new twist to the most mundane of acts: seeing.

A young Egyptian falls in love with the Hebrew slave woman Miriam, sister of Moses and Aaron, and follows her and the Jewish people as they flee Egypt for their 40-year journey through the wilderness to the borders of the Promised Land.

This is a fire of devotion, connection, awareness. The flames bring light that helps us see where we are and who we are meant to be. We tend this fire through practice, through mitzvot: acts of connection and love.

As Passover 2012 ends, let's finally break the bonds, and liberate ourselves from Top Rabbis lists. America has enough idols. Let's smash this one (the list, not the rabbis).

When I first heard that there was not a shred of evidence discovered in the Sinai Desert that a large number of Jews had wandered for 40 years, I thought that wasn't such a big deal. I mean, it's a desert, right?

The Israelites may have left Egypt, but in many ways, we still experience Egypt. Humans still treat people who are different as "other." Until that stops, we are all still enslaved to prejudice and its consequences.

The first ritual the Israelites ever enacted, the rite of passage that prepared them to leave bondage in Egypt, is one that can be re-imagined every year to guide us in discovering who we are and who we might become.

By killing all preconceptions we have about who or what God is, we do indeed free God simply to be, as stated in Exodus and by great theologians and philosophers ever since.

In congregations across the country, people will hear the powerful story of the Israelites crossing the sea (Exodus 14:19-31). How will this text sound alongside the other texts of 9/11?

Amid the great tensions, contradictions and reversals in their flight to the Promised Land, the Israelites glorified God. Liturgical singing in churches today glorifies Our Lord in the same way.

It is not as easy as it might seem to move away from hatred, since it can feel like giving up or giving in. When we are tied by hatred, whether to our stories or our religion, we cannot be free.