Hello Readers,
When the shops are full of Easter Eggs, tins of paint, rolls of wallpaper and trays of bedding plants etc., You know it will soon be Easter, the first big holiday after Christmas. It marks the end of a long dark winter and the beginning of something new, with hope in the air and the promise of lighter mornings, evenings and a warmer climate.
There are several special days that surround the Easter festivities, Lent, Ash Wednesday, Mothering Sunday, Holy Week and Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Shrove Tuesday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday. All these very important days are filled with extremely interesting stories about their origins and meanings.
Pagan traditions give us the word ‘Easter’, which originates from the word ‘Eostre’. The Anglo Saxon word for April was ‘Eostre-monath’, which means ‘The month of openings. However it is important to note that the Christians celebrated the resurrection of Christ long before the word ‘Easter’ was used, and the word they used for the celebration was ‘Pascha’, which is derived from and linked the Jewish festival of Passover. April was also named after the Anglo Saxon goddess Esostre and rituals related to the Goddess focus on new beginnings, symbolised by the Easter egg and fertility, which is symbolised by the hare or Easter Bunny.
Easter is called a moveable feast because the date of Easter changes every year. Easter Sunday can fall on any date from March 22nd to April 25th. The reason for this variation in the date is based on the lunar calendar moon. Easter always falls on the first Sunday following the full moon, the Paschal Full Moon after March 21st. If the full moon falls on a Sunday than then Easter is the next Sunday.
The first eggs given at Easter were birds eggs. These eggs were painted in bright colours to give them a further meaning as a gift. An Anglo Saxon legend tells how the Goddess Eostre, found a wounded bird and turned it into a hare so that it could survive during winter. The hare found it could lay eggs so it decorated them each Spring and left them as an offering to the Goddess.
Maundy Thursday is also called Holy Thursday and is the beginning of the three day celebration of Easter because it represents the Last Supper of Jesus Christ with the Apostles. It was also the night that Jesus was betrayed by Judas in the Garden of Gethsemane. During the Last Supper, Jesus washed his disciples feet. This act has sometimes been followed in history as a way of reminding Rulers that they are here to serve their subjects. In Britain the Queen follows a very traditional role of giving Maundy Thursday money to a group of pensioners. This tradition dates back to the 13th Century, from the reign of King Edward 1st, and every year the Queen attends a Maundy Thursday service in one of the many Cathedrals throughout the country.
People talk about giving something up for ‘Lent’. It’s a bit like making a New Year’s Resolution, only not everyone sticks to their promises. Lent lasts for 40 days, not including Sundays. It’s a time when Christians prepare for Easter by thinking of the things they have done wrong. A time of repentance. Lent used to be a time for fasting and going without food. The modern way is to give up favourite things they enjoy like sweets, favourite food and other indulgences and this often results in them giving money to a favourite Charity. The colour Purple is linked to Lent and in some churches the alter is covered in a Purple cloth as are the garments of the Vicar or Priest. Purple is chosen because it’s the colour associated with mourning, as was the sadness of Christ and it’s also associated with Royalty, and so it celebrates Christ coming as a King.
It is during the Easter period when my family and I love to get together and enjoy one another’s company. It’s a time for us to visit friends, take the Lulas and my daughter’s doggie out, Hugo, for a good long gallop across the fields. We get stuck into the gardening and decorating and generally freshen our homes and gardens ready for the glorious summer that awaits us all.
We would all like to wish you all a very Happy Easter and hope that its filled with lovely surprises and long, beautiful days.
Until Next Week,
Love and Light,
Linda and The Lulas xxx
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