I want to say something about Easter, but I don't know what. It was a strange Easter this year. It didn't seem like Easter. It was cold. And cloudy. I attended two different services, neither of which was typical. It's interesting how much traditions color our world.
It's not that these services were "bad;" to the contrary. I really appreciated our VC service. But it's the break from traditions that is unsettling. No choir. No stained glass window with sunshine pouring through. No traditional Easter message. No new Easter clothes, no "dressed to the nines" congregants. No organ music swelling with emotion. No hymns. No Easter Lilies.
I must say I didn't expect to feel cheated. Why would I? This year's VC service was incredibly meaningful and thought provoking. Quiet. Solemn. Contemplative. Breaking into joyful celebration at the end.
Why does tradition somehow seem to "make" the holiday? And when we don't have Easter egg hunts, or family pictures taken, when we don't have a big Easter dinner with ham and whatnot, when family is far away - why does it not seem like Easter? In reality, that is NOT Easter. We have just made that Easter.
I dunno. I feel a bit disconcerted and disconnected this morning. Like something is not quite right. Could be I'm just tired. Could be my upcoming surgery. Could be a lot of things. Because I learned something, and was ministered to in a very real way at both services I attended. And again it was driven home to me the power of incredible love, and the need for that in my life. Just to begin to increase the capacity for loving others, for acceptance of others, for showing more mercy, more grace. To renew myself in this way this Easter.
Easter was good. Just not what I expected......
easter
2 comments:
thanks for these thoughts karen.... nice honest real blog entry here.... i loved it... hope you don't mind, i quoted you on my blog! :-)
Nothing wrong with traditions. That's the point of them - they're familiar, they help us feel connected to our past, to our roots. It's understandable then that you would feel disconcerted by the VC service. It's only our second one, and we haven't had time to establish any traditions yet.
And believe me, if we had a choir, stained glass, and an organ I would have loved to incorporate that stuff too (and nothing said people couldn't have come dressed up. I'm surprised that more people didn't.) But we make do with what we have.
Oh, and I was going to have us sing an opening hymn (And Can It Be), but I cut it at the last minute because the hymns off iTunes are always so bad. I'll try to remember to do hymns for next year. :)
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