What is Easter?

Astraw poll conducted by the London Sunday Telegraph in 1995 illustrated how quickly knowledge of religious terms is disappearing from Britain. Chocolate eggs and bunnies are what most people think Easter is about, the survey revealed. A woman with a Master's degree from Cambridge said, "I know Easter is a religious occasion but I could not tell you what it is about." "It is Jesus's birthday or something," said a teenager. "We do religious studies at school but not Easter. It's all about other religions."

In hoc signo

Again in Britain and also in Germany, USA, India, Japan and Australia, a survey of 7,000 people showed that while 88 per cent were able to identify the "golden arches" logo of McDonald's fast food empire, only 54 per cent recognized the Cross, 2,000-year-old emblem of Christianity. As Auberon Waugh commented in the Weekly Telegraph (Feb. 1996),

"I do not find this surprising or shocking. Christianity nowadays catches the imagination and inspires the loyalty of a fairly small minority. Even among active, evangelical Christians there is a tendency to play down that part of the Bible story which involves the Cross. Young people tend to find it unsympathetic, we are told. They look to religions for an assurance that life is a feast of generous emotions, and do not find it in the Cross."

This fits in with an observation of Ottawa Archbishop Marcel Gervais who, in a sermon on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 21, 1996, recalled how

"Last year, a group of high school students were given a tour of the Cathedral. They seemed quite interested and impressed, but on seeing the Crucifix, one of them asked, `Who is that guy?"'

What is Easter?

Easter celebrates the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus and the Resurrection, in turn, is the keystone of the Christian faith.

In St. Paul's letter to the Corinthians, we read: If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain (1 Cor. 15:14). St. Paul sees the Resurrection as the basis of the Christian faith and the keystone, as it were, of the entire edifice of doctrine and life built up on Revelation. Hence all the Church's preaching, from apostolic times, down the centuries and spanning the generations, even to the present day, makes its appeal to the Resurrection and draws from it its driving and persuasive force and its vigour. It is easy to understand why.

As Pope John Paul II points out, "The Resurrection was first of all the confirmation of all that Christ has `done and taught.' It was the divine seal stamped on His words and life. He Himself had indicated to His disciples and adversaries this definitive sign of His truth. "On the first Easter day the angel told the women at the empty tomb: `He has risen, as he said' (Mt. 28:6). If this word and promise of His are revealed as true, then all His other words and promises possess the power of truth that does not pass away, as He Himself had proclaimed: `Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.' No stronger, more decisive and more authoritative proof than the resurrection from the dead could have been imagined or asked for. All the truths, including those most impenetrable to the human mind, find their justification, even from the rational point of view, in the fact that the risen Christ gave the definitive proof, promised beforehand, of His divine authority.

"Thus the truth of Christ's divinity itself is confirmed by the Resurrection . . . ." (Easter, 1989).

"By thy holy cross Thou hast redeemed the world." Long after McDonald's golden arches have been forgotten, this Christian symbol will continue to remind people of Christ's sacrifice. And Easter will remain just what the Holy Father has so eloquently explained it to be--the keystone of the Christian faith.