Easter

Sacrifice and Resurrection

 The date of Easter, the holiest day in the Christian calendar, varies from year to year, according to a complex formula. This year, Easter Sunday falls on March 27, 2005. This is the central focus of Christianity, but there is more to Easter than meets the eye! Many ancient religions also celebrated the death and resurrection of their god. Much of the symbolism associated with these earlier stories has been incorporated into the Christian Festivity.

The Easter Season marks the most important ritual celebration in the Christian Church. It celebrates the passion, crucifixion, death and entombment of the Lord Jesus Christ, followed by his resurrection and return to a new life. Jesus Christ, who flourished in Palestine some two thousand years ago and whose birth (defined as year "0") marks the beginning of the current Western Gregorian Calendar, was the founder of the Christian faith and is revered by Christians as the true saviour and Son of God.

The Easter season begins on Easter Day (Easter Sunday) and the preliminary festivities are known as Holy Week, which is itself the last week of the purificatory period called Lent.

Holy Week is the main introduction to Easter, beginning with Palm Sunday (Passion Sunday), celebrating the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem riding on an ass. This is part of the prophesied fulfilment of his mission, since the ass has symbolic significance and is seen as a sign of his being the messiah, or redeemer.

This process is followed by Holy Thursday (Maundy Thursday) when Jesus instituted the sacrament of communion, or the Lord's Supper. It also marks his betrayal by his renegade disciple, Judas.

The following day is called Good Friday ("God's Friday"), when Jesus was condemned to death, crucified, died and was buried in the tomb. This is the holiest day of the year for Christians, because it marks the symbolic sacrifice of the pure and perfect Son of God, who is believed to have died so that the rest of us could be freed from our burden of sin and be forgiven by God so that we might find everlasting life and bliss.

The next day, Holy Saturday, is when Jesus lay in the grave, but the following day, Easter Sunday, is when Jesus miraculously rose from the dead and vacated the tomb. In other words, his old life had ended and his new and glorious life had begun. This is emblematic of the Christian ideal of redemption through repentance (the death of the old life), baptism (washing out the past) and being born again (as a freshly redeemed soul).