蜜芽传媒

The recent row over the dropping of Easter from a description of a National Trust egg hunt led to critics claiming that this weekend is becoming a secular spring festival. Yet the word Easter already has secular connections, rather than the religious roots that the word for this festival has in other European languages. The French call it Paques, the Italians Pasqua and the Spanish Pascua, and they鈥檙e all derived from the Jewish feast of Pesach or Passover, when God was said to free his people from slavery and pass over them. It was at the feast of Passover that Christ was crucified.

In contrast, many scholars claim the word Easter is directly connected to an ancient pagan goddess whose symbol is a hare. It鈥檚 all to do with spring.

But that makes Easter an entirely appropriate word for tomorrow鈥檚 feast of the Resurrection when Christian celebrate Christ鈥檚 rising from the dead. Easter鈥檚 date is moveable and determined by nature. It is always held on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox. The equinox is a day made up of 12 hours of light and darkness 鈥� in other words a moment of harmony. The natural world is in balance again as life returns at springtime after the dead of winter.

At tonight鈥檚 Easter vigils in churches across the land, the Exultet will be sung, including these words: 鈥淥 truly blessed night when things of heaven are wed to those of earth, and divine to the human.鈥� In other words, Christians see the whole of nature as a metaphor for the Resurrection of Christ. This is also beautifully expressed in the hymn Now the Green Blade Riseth, which says of Jesus lying in the tomb: 鈥淟aid in the earth, like grain that sleeps unseen, Love is come again, like wheat that springs up green鈥�.

This harmony, though, is not just about nature. The Gospel accounts of the Resurrection are also about restored relationships. Luke鈥檚 version tells us that Mary Magdalene and other women first see that Jesus鈥� tomb is empty and Peter runs to the tomb, finding discarded linen cloths. There are sightings of Jesus by several people together and then Luke records that he appeared to Peter on his own. This is the same Peter who denied knowing him on the day of his trial, and now there is this encounter between one let down by the other鈥檚 cowardice. A moment of reconciliation, of harmony. As the world watches, while tensions rise between America, North Korea and China, the message of Christ鈥檚 Resurrection 鈥� that even the most damaged relationships can be repaired, can rise again 鈥� is needed more than ever.

Show less