Dear Friends,
When Nan and I sat down to dinner the other night, our conversation turned to Easter and how we would celebrate in this extraordinary time of pandemic. Pretty much every one of our Easter traditions will have to change this year. No new spring clothes to celebrate the day. No delicious Easter feast with family and friends around the table. No Easter hike, our long-standing tradition. No Easter egg hunt with our granddaughter – even with FaceTime, it’s not the same. There’s just no way to digitally hide or find eggs and treats.
For most of us, Easter means happy gatherings of groups of people. Remember the classic movie Easter Parade? As Irving Berlin wrote, “In your Easter bonnet, with all the frills upon it, You’ll be the grandest lady in the Easter parade!” No parades this year – no gatherings of more than ten people. No Easter egg rolls on the White House lawn or in neighborhood parks. No church services. So many no’s!
And even though Nan and I don’t yet know all of Scottville’s Easter traditions, we find ourselves already missing them. We won’t gather on Maundy Thursday to remember and re-enact the Last Supper. Nor will we come together on Good Friday to quietly remember Jesus’s Last Seven Words on the cross. And I don’t know if Scottsville Presbyterians gather at church in the still, dark dawn of Easter, but Easter has always begun for me at sunrise, with Mary Magdalene and the other women discovering the empty tomb and then seeing their resurrected Lord. I was about to outline my hopes for a sunrise service with Session before we were hit by the new rules of our lives under the threat of coronavirus. Perhaps most of all, we’ll miss being with our beloved congregation at our Easter service, joining together to affirm, “Christ Is Risen Indeed! Alleluia!” All of these joyous celebrations of the Risen Christ have traditionally involved gathered people, and this year, none of us will be able to do any of them.
But even in the midst of pandemic, Easter is a time for a resounding YES! And that yes might well be even more meaningful this year than it’s ever been.
We may not be able to be together for our traditional celebration of Easter or for the Holy Week events that lead to it, but I hope we can continue to be spiritually connected and centered as an undivided, un-isolated people of shared faith and conviction. Perhaps we’ll become even more centered. We are always united as a people of faith.
These complicated times offer us an opportunity to find new and meaningful ways to observe this most important week in the life of our church, even within the confines of our social/physical isolation. If you’d like to share your beloved family traditions and/or your new innovations, please send me an e-mail telling me about them, and I’ll share them with the congregation. Hearing what others are doing might kindle even more new ideas for our individual reflection and celebration.
One new innovation is, of course, these Daily Notes. Starting tomorrow, my reflections will focus on the multiple scripture readings for Palm Sunday, and then I’ll share some thoughts about our lectionary readings for Holy Week, culminating with the Empty Tomb on Easter Sunday.
May we be together in spirit, faith, and heart as we journey beside one another, despite pandemic isolation, to the glorious YES of Easter!
Let us pray together,
Almighty and Present God, we praise you with hearts filled with thanksgiving for the love you continually shower upon us. As we prepare to celebrate Christ’s gift of abundant life to us all, we ask for the wisdom and perspective to recognize the essence of the sacrificial gift Christ offers us, even in these new and challenging times. Help us to hear your still small voice. We hunger to praise you with shouts of Hosanna and to welcome you into our hearts. Even though we are separated, we are together as one, because you are always near. We thank you and praise you for your holy presence among us. Amen.