Easter at St Johns Southgate

Easter celebrations in most Christian communities will soon begin. For many communities those celebrations include Palm Sunday (April 13), Maundy Thursday (April 17), Good Friday (April 18) and Easter Day (April 20).

Each of those days commemorate significant moments in Jesus Christ’s journey to his death and resurrection and explore how those moments intersect with our own lives and meaning.

While they are extremely enjoyable, doughy buns and chocolate eggs are not essential parts of these celebrations.

I write this article to provide an understanding of what might be happening at the churches in your neighbourhood, and why those who participate give it such energy and importance.

Easter is about action and change for what is good. For people of Christian faith, that action begins with God and God’s desire for what is good for all creation. This includes people.

We might assume that such good equates only to comfort, safety and prosperity but these are the very things that can set us on paths of conflict and division with each other, and on self-critical paths of internal, fragmenting conflict where we berate ourselves that who we are is never enough (read about the power of the word “lack” in: Parker, G. Tavella, G. & Eyers, K. (2021) – Burnout: A guide to identifying burnout and pathways to recovery. Melbourne: Allen & Unwin).

People of Christian faith believe that human solutions for the human problems of being and meaning revert to the very assumptions and actions that first caused those problems, and so nothing concerning human experience and behaviour changes. Nothing changes because we don’t change. We give priority to our own desires and bend to our angst above all else, thereby discounting the lives of other people and the earth itself.

An Easter perspective draws us to look outside of ourselves to God for change. Change which is good and offers rich meaning. Change that gives life. We believe that change comes through what Jesus Christ accomplished through his death and resurrection for us. Easter is a celebration of the new, changed life that God gives and works in us.

Your neighbourhood churches will give expression to this and more in their own ways. Some of it will be confronting, and other parts will be beautiful and sublime as it encompasses the breadth of divine and human experience.

Easter connects the unfolding drama of God’s death and life with our own, where the possibility of change for all that is good is alive for us to see, hear and follow.

You’re welcome to join those celebrations. Find out when they are through your local church’s noticeboard or website.

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