I’ve been over at my sister’s the last couple of days. Despite my brother fixing IT for a living, he is unable to fix his own computer which died the other day, so horror of horrors, I have had no access to the internet since Friday.
I had a good time at my sister’s. We went out for dinner on Friday night to a place that served really nice food – and in vast quantities. My brother in law also really liked it – but wasn’t so keen the next day when he couldn’t stop throwing up and other stuff that I won’t mention…
I woke up yesterday morning and realised that I was dreaming about what I would do if I hoovered up a large spider. The issue being what would I do about it being in my hoover. The two solutions were to immediately phone my mum and get her to empty it or to put my hoover in the car and drive over to my mum’s house and get her to empty it. Whatever happened it could not remain in my hoover for any longer than absolutely necessary particularly as I have a bagless hoover so you can see the contents of it. I’m not sure why I was dreaming about that except that Caroline over at In Search of Adam posted a photo of a horrible spider the other day (I’m not providing a link to the actual post, you’ll have to scroll down through her blog if you want to see that).
Anyway this morning I was still as my sister’s and we hid some Kinder eggs in the garden and my nephew then had to search for them and there was a general Easter egg exchange. How long will my Easter eggs last me this year? I don’t actually think as long as last year, but we shall see.
I read something on someone’s blog earlier and it just makes me want to defend Easter a bit. I won’t tell you whose blog it was* as I’m not into slating other bloggers, but I just thought it was a bit harsh to totally dismiss Easter as a “hijacked pagan festival”. I just get a bit tired of people dismissing Christian celebrations. I think it is a bit disrespectful and people don’t tend to do it about other religions but somehow Christianity is always “fair game”.
Without going into major detail on this, the timing of Easter has its origins in Judaism. The death and resurrection of Jesus (which is what Easter is about) was during the Jewish Passover, which is always in the Spring, and Easter’s specific timing is connected to when the first full moon is after the Spring Equinox (and is why it si not a fixed date). Now there is a Pagan festival called Eostre which also takes place in the spring but apart from the words possibly coming from the same origin, the two are not connected and Christians have not “nicked” a pagan festival. Basically it's timing is connected to Passover and as Christianity has its origins in Judaism (but has a different emphasis given the resurrection etc), I think that is fair enough.
In defence of Christmas as well (I’m on a roll here!) I’m not sure the church has ever really taught that Jesus was born on 25 December. They picked a day and that was 25 December, it could have been 20 March or 6 August or 9 November or any day you like but the point is that the particular date was not significant, it is what it represented in terms of Jesus being born. Yes it was a date of a Pagan festival that was chosen, and maybe that was slightly controversial and possibly entirely deliberate, but that doesn’t mean you have to write off the whole thing because of that.
I think it’s easy to knock people for what they believe. It’s easy to think that those who have religious beliefs base that on wishful thinking or never question what they believe. But if people are so willing to dismiss significant religious celebrations then might I suggest that it might be worth checking out why you believe what you believe. Why are you so certain that what you think is right? I’m not suggesting you have to accept what any religion teaches but maybe show a bit of tolerance and thought for why a particular celebration might take place when it does and don’t just dismiss it.
Let’s not lose our sense of wonder and respect for things that maybe we don’t ourselves understand but that we are invited to be part of. So, Happy Easter, however you choose to celebrate it – and even if you don't.
*It’s not someone I link to, but I do read it regularly and it is actually a good blog. What I have written above is not directed at that person it is just an explanation of why it sometimes riles me when people are a bit dismissive of such things. I could actually give you a much better explanation of all of this but I'm sure what I have said is more than enough!
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