Written by Fiona, Free Ticket Giveaway Team
Lisa was born and grew up in a Catholic Family. She is not a practicing catholic, but has the belief and faith in the principle of good and bad. This was enough for Lisa.
Summer is one of Lisa’s favorite time of the year. It is when she can have a long vacation among other weeks of the year because of Holy Week, Easter. Lisa would go to the beach with friends and come back on Black Saturday to celebrate Easter with her family. She never really bothered why every year, there is an enormous effort of celebrating the coming, the death, and the resurrection of the Christ. She was just happy to have a few days off and spend sometime with her friends. One year, coming back form the beach earlier than usual she noticed a very large procession in her village. It was a Good Friday and there seemed to be alot of people on the streets—because she learned, there’s a the procession of the Way of the Cross or “Sinakulo.” Lisa decided to immerse in the crowd and watch the procession coming past. There was a long line of people crowned with barbed wires, walked down the street carrying heavy crosses or logs over their shoulders and their arms are tied up. Some are whipping at their back, with cuts of sharp blades. It was the re-enactment of the station of the cross from where Christ was whipped and carried the cross before the crucifiction.
The “Sinakulo” ended, lisa stood there still in amazement. She went home and connected to the internet and started searching and reading about her religion. The big question Why are there people willing to do what those people did at the procession today?
Reading on, she searched for the history of Easter Season. She already knew that this is the end of the Season of Lent and the celebration of death and the resurrection of Christ. She found that Easter might actually be an adaption or conversion of a pagan belief to Christianity. Early Anglo-Saxon celebrated the feast of fertility every spring and gave respect to its deity, Eostre. When Christianity came about, the missionaries saw that it coincided around the time of the resurrection of Christ so, it adapted the name of the diety and the celebration to increase conversion. It is said that Easter was the foundation of Christian faith as this is the time when Christ has proved his prophecy that he will die and rise from the dead. Although there was no indication of the Easter festival in the Bible, the Christians still regard this as one of the most important festivals of the year. It falls on the first Sunday after the full moon that occurs on the vernal equinox. Easter has already created many traditions and customs around the world, and modern times has also added the symbolism of eggs and bunnies much more believed to be derived from the pagan festivity.
Lisa’s research about Easter basically took home one main meaning… it is the chance for a new beginning for everyone.
Happy Easter
