CAUTION: If small children (or adults still longing to be small children) are reading this - I'm warning you now, the Easter Bunny is about to be discussed in full detail.
There are eggs and plastic grass strewn from one end of the house to another. My mom friends are "making a list and checking it twice" regarding what an over-sized imaginary. Every store has beautiful (and overpriced) frilly dresses hanging in the front windows.
It can only mean one thing: Easter is just around the corner.
I've caught myself a few times nearly uttering the blasphemous phrase, "I hate Easter." Truth be told, I LOVE Easter. I love the message of redemption, the time to reflect on the most significant even in Human history - the atonement, sacrifice and resurrection of my Savior. The act that will ensure my myriad of human faults won't be enough to keep me from exaltation.
What I don't like is "Easter" - the "celebration part." And not just because I don't like eggs and I get stuck with a ton of them every spring. One can only hide them in so many things, and while the girls would gladly eat them 3 meals a day I cannot in good conscience indulge them.
I love spring. I love egg hunts. I love giving little presents to the girls. I love frilly dresses (as long as I'm not the one that has to wear them - or pay full price for them). But why do we have to completely overshadow what is arguably the most religious, solemn holiday of the year with fluff and consumerism?
Maybe I'm jaded - after all - there was no Easter Bunny in my house growing up. We got small baskets, but my parents made sure it was known that they were the providers. We did egg hunts and egg dying and had an annual Easter picnic - but we did it the day before Easter. Easter Sunday was a day to don new dresses (or dress in our best clothes) and attend services. It was a slightly more reverent, religious Sunday than normal Sundays.
One could argue the same thing about Christmas - but I dissent to some degree. Christmas is FAR too over-commercialized and very much a "gimme" holiday and could stand to be toned down a lot. However, the celebration of Christ's birth is about good will to all men and the gift our Father in Heaven gave the world in the form of his only begotten Son. I find no fault with giving in the spirit of giving, of celebrating life and family and good will. Even Santa is fine (to some degree) - as he embodies the spirit of Christmas in giving and celebrating the good.
The Easter Bunny and baskets stuffed to the brim with more candy than is handed out on Halloween are another thing entirely. I understand where the tradition of egg coloring and Easter Bunnies and so forth come from - as part of the Spring Equinox celebrations and the joyous celebration of the new season. But over-sized furry mammals and plastic eggs (and ESPECIALLY that horrendous green plastic grass) have incredibly little to do with one of the most solemn, significant and religious observances there is. I am fine with the "rebirth" theme - after all, the celebratory point of Easter is resurrection and the rebirth of humanity's soul as we are provided a way back "home." Yet other than an alarmingly high fertility/reproductive rate, rabbits are still a long ways from being the symbols of the true Easter holiday.
I'm not totally grinchy. Woodstock and Pebbles get small token gifts, and will color and hunt for eggs (I'm soliciting egg recipes now - only the good ones, please) - on Saturday. On Sunday they will dress in nice clothes (probably not new clothes because it is disgusting how many clothes they already have) and attend church.
Some would call me a whacked-out religious zealot. I'm not. I have a very simple faith and I am not nearly as devout as I would like. I simply dislike the rampant "gimme" holiday that Easter has become - without regard to the amazing miracle it celebrates.
Okay, off my soap box. Back to cleaning up that @#$@%^$^@$^$^&%&^$&%*&(*( Easter grass.
4 comments:
I HATE Easter grass! It is of the devil. As for Easter itself, I am looking for ways to make it more spiritual. I like the fun stuff, but none of it will be under the guise of the Easter bunny, and we plan to leave one egg in our Easter egg hunt empty so that we can talk about the empty tomb.
There simply must be Cadbury eggs, though. I can't live without them.
We do "baskets" the day before, but we tend to just use the celebration part as an excuse to get Spring outdoor toys instead of candy.
Here in Guatemala - Holy Week is a week of over eating, parades of large statutes and "cultas" or evangelical church services that are LOUD (we're talking loudspeakers) and go until 11 pm or even midnight.
It's so HARD to remember the message of Easter with so many things clouding it out. Hard and frustrating, and while I don't have children to indulge, I do have to put on a happy face and go to about 5 people's houses to eat the same food and pretend it's the best. UG!
I should say, I have a serious weakness for Easter candy. And spring.
Phil - it would be hard to remember anything with all that eating going on! :)
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