As we begin the Lenten period, we are focusing
on Lent and Easter in our RE lessons and during Chapel services.
Easter is a busy time for a lot of retailers with Chocolate and hot cross bun sales keeping tills busy. What a lot of people are perhaps not as aware of are the origins of some of these commercial traditions.
However, Lent and Easter are more than just about chocolate eggs and bunnies. Lent is time to look inward to seek how we might more fully accept God’s love, peace and grace in our lives. Like Advent, Lent is a period of 40 days of preparation and waiting. Advent is about getting the world around us ready for Christ's arrival. Lent is about getting ourselves ready for Christ's departure. During this period, some Christians perform fasting or avoiding certain things, this is not just food, it can be anything that will help focus the mind on why Easter is important. Fasting is about penance (self-denial) that allows room in your life for God to do something new.
During Easter, people eat hot cross buns which have a cross shape on the top. This is meant as a reminder which is why these buns are generally produced during Easter. The custom of giving eggs at Easter is a celebration of new life. Eggs were always thought to be special because although they do not seem alive, they have life within them especially at springtime when chicks hatch out. Long ago, people gave gifts of eggs carved from wood or precious stones. This changed to chocolate which has led to the huge popularity that we see today. Bunnies and chicks are also linked to Easter because the young ones tend to hatch or are born during Spring, the season that Easter occurs in for Europe and the middle east, the home of early Christianity.