Easter

So, since last Sunday was Palm Sunday, and this Sunday is Easter Sunday, I am reminded of my time in the Holy Land. I’ve been thinking a lot of the two Easter seasons I spent in Jerusalem. I blogged about at least one of them while I was there (here).

As far as I can tell, Mormons don’t celebrate Easter as most other Christians do. Don’t get me wrong in any way- Mormons are Christian, anyone who tells you differently is either a) very misinformed, b) has a specific axe to grind (“You won’t accept our Baptism!? Ok, we don’t accept you in the Christianity Club”), c) has an entirely erroneous and nonsensical definition of what it is to be a Christian that doesn’t jive logically with present or historical Christianity (Read this book). Or perhaps some mixture of all three.

The fact is, growing up for me, Easter was just another line of interesting holidays that just got lip service because there were more important thing afoot near the same time. By lip service I mean my family celebrated it, but less as a religious holiday like we did Christmas, and more like a general holiday, meaning chocolate bunnies, Easter egg hunts, and a little basket or bag of goodies. I do have to hand it to my parents though. Most often I remember receiving socks and/or a book for Easter. There really isn’t anything as comfortable as a brand new pair of socks, and books are always high on my great-present-idea lists. I’m looking forward to continuing that tradition someday with my little rug rats.

But having spent time with other Christians celebrating Easter festivals in a number of different ways, as well as doing so in Jerusalem itself, has made me want to rethink what I usually do at Easter time, as well as why I do it. (I think having my own kid and thinking about family traditions I want to pass on definitely has something to do with this too).

The fact of Easter in my life has always been that it is overshadowed by LDS General Conference. The Church has two of them every year- one the first week in April, the other the first week in October. Since Easter usually, but not always, falls some time near the beginning of April, it coincides many times with Conference weekend. What this means generally is that Mormons are more likely to be glued to their television/computer screens listening to the message of Christ as delivered by living prophets and apostles, rather than partaking in any types of other services during the day- especially not the typical sunrise service that greats the morning on Resurrection Day. This is also compounded by the fact that a lot of the families I know generally take it easy that day, maybe not changing out of PJs until well after the first session ends at noon. So, on days that GenCon and Easter coincide, in my mind, GenCon will almost always win out.

But there’s a whole lot of other stuff associated with the Easter Season in traditional Christianity. And I think there is definitely room for lots more ways to remember the Resurrection. After all, Passion week is a full seven days, and Lent is even longer. So, while in J’lem, I kinda made myself a vow that with my family, I would try to have better traditions of remembering all of Passion week, from Palm Sunday, to Spy Wednesday (I just learned this one- it’s called Spy Wednesday traditionally because in the Gospels Wednesday of Chirst’s last week is bookended by verses of betrayal by Judas!) to Good Friday to Easter Sunday. So, this year, I went out and bought my wife an early Easter present, this. It’s been a good book to read through for our scripture study every day, to look at and commemorate every day of Passion Week.

Now this year, GenCon didn’t coincide with Easter. But you know what did? Orthodox Easter! Usually, the two are a couple weeks apart because of the differences between the Julian and Gregorian calendars, but this year they fell on the same day, meaning that it would have been even more fun to witness the revelry and the rivalry which would have been all over. I wish I could have seen it. I'm also sad that in my time there, I never got into the Holy Fire ceremony.

So, the point of all this is: when it comes down to it, I think attending GenCon is a perfectly perfect way to celebrate Easter when the two coincide- to listen to the testimonies of Christ’s called and ordained apostles bear testimony of His Resurrection. However, I think there can be more room for Passion week remembrance. I’m hoping to keep this up in my family. We may not do a physical processional, but I hope to lead my children in a more literary procession through the scriptures that bear witness of Christ.

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Other Random thoughts:

While thinking about Easter, Passover, and General Conference, it occurred to me that the Church celebrates two fantastically large gatherings at precisely the same time as ancient traditional Spring and Harvest festivals. I thought that was pretty neat. There might not be anything to it, but anything that can link the Akitu festival and GenCon is pretty sweet.

Speaking of GenCon, saw this on the Bloggernacle updates and thought, hey another good family tradition that should start at the Smith house.