By Blog Editor
Easter is not just celebrated on Easter Sunday, in fact, the Easter Season is 50 days, and in Kathy Coffey’s latest book, The Best of Being Catholic, she writes why Easter is so important to Catholics.
The Best of Being Catholic has three sections:
1) The Beliefs We Cherish
2) The Seasons We Celebrate
3) The Company We Keep
In Chapter 13, which is focused on Easter, Coffey explains that it can be helpful to separate the religious meaning of Easter from all of the “cultural accumulations”
This happened experientially for me one year when Easter brought snow and sickness. Without lilies, bunnies, bonnets, egg hunts, pastels, or yellow marshmellow chicks, this was the Acid Test of the feast. In a friend’s mountain home, sniffling, coughing and watching dreary weather, would the message of resurrection still hold?
Indeed it came powerfully, through a totally unexpected channel: clearing skies and sunlight gradually stroking the mountaintops. What had been grey fog parted to reveal luminous peaks, emerging slowly. It echoed the absence and presence/hidden and revealed/hide and seek themes of this season. The resurrected Jesus may be unrecognized or invisible, but is still with his friends in a less physical way.
If there had been musical accompaniment, those mountains streaked with sun would’ve invited the Alleluia chorus, belted loudly. The mountains unfurled banners of good news: granite heavily grounded, yet airily sweeping the skies. While it’s not our traditional image, a healing sleep without coughing fit Easter nevertheless: joy unexpectedly found in the midst of sorrow.
TO BE CONTINUED…
Kathy Coffey 