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Easter..
Citta
Veteran
Easter has always been seen as time of renewal. It is seen that way by pagans , it is seen that way by Jews celebrating Passover.
It is seen that way by Christians..
There is no reason why Buddhists should not celebrate the turning of the year and the growing of the light, and renew their efforts towards compassion and wisdom..
And if chocolate and Simnel cake form part of the picture too...all the better !
Happy Easter all.
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Comments
I celebrate kwanzaa so I don't see why not :P Happy Easter to you too
Bit self-righteous, but I take the sentiment as intended...
And you know exactly what I mean.
Do Americans have Simnel cake ?
I doubt it. They're not big on marzipan.
I am big BECAUSE of marzipan..
Well that and bread and pasta..
and potatoes..and cous-cous...and..
It seems these days that chocolate IS the religion of Easter. I'm sure there are people around who don't even know about any religious connection other than the worshipping of the Easter Bunny.
The lovely Easter Bunny
Lol! That is one seriously scary looking Easter bunny.
The Eggs-tremely demonic Rabbit of Pasquadena...
From a non-denominational standpoint, I think of Easter as the celebration of our constant death and resurrection in every moment. It fits so well with spring. With the blooming of the flower. With the unfolding of unbounded love which grows stronger in every instant. Especially this one.
Very nice..
I see easter as a day to call my mom after she gets home from church.
This year's a little different. Morning drive to Boulder for practice and a meditation class.
Job hunting, so no 420 celebration . :crazy:
No, we have Pop Tarts though. It's not actually food, not that that matters.
I don't even know what simnel cake is, so I'll go out on a limb and say at least in Minnesota, it's not a thing, lol. What is it?
We celebrate spring like crazy here. This winter has been long, cold, and snowy. This morning, it is raining, snowing, sleeting and blowing like mad. We still have snowbanks that are larger than our suv. But tomorrow it'll be 60, so we will celebrate Easter outside. The younger kids like to look for eggs so we are getting those colored shortly, and then we bought a new rocket to shoot off and some kites. It's just nice to be outside!
But we don't participate in any of the rites of Christianity as far as Easter is concerned. We don't celebrate lent or Good Friday or any of those things. I always feel a bit odd celebrating Easter, and Christmas, too, but our families are Christian so it's just a good time to spend together. We use it as a time to talk about why other people celebrate it and what the symbols mean (like Christmas, many of which are Pagan in nature). Anyhow, a good time all around. Pass the deviled eggs followed by the cadbury eggs, please.
I sent out Easter cards to the family, and my kids always get baskets sent to them in the mail by my Mom...:) .. I'll be spending Easter Sunday at the monastery.....
That's a nice way of looking at it.
Here's something that occurred to me a couple of Easters ago if anyone's interested: bored after-dinner writing: a freudian easter.
Simnel cake is a traditional cake eaten in the UK at Easter @karasti..its a fruitcake with a layer of marzipan in the middle and covered with another layer of marzipan ' frosting '.
On top is one large ball of marzipan to represent Jesus and 12 smaller balls of marzipan round the circumference representing the apostles.
The origin of the name 'Simnel ' is unknown, but the earliest reference to it date from 1276 AD.
Its delicious..if you like marzipan. Which I do..too much.
It pays to be Russian Orthodox this time of year. You go to the evening Easter service, circumambulate the church, and sit down to a nice midnight dinner with traditional Easter bread and special cheese spread afterwards. Yum!
Good plan, there is a Greek Orthodox Church a short walk away. I haz Easter meditation plan . . . ah they had a service at 2.00 AM should be open all day . . .
time to go meet the Easter Bunny . . . the power of Christ compels me . . .
I bought some bleach to clean the toilet with the other day and to be absolute astonishment, it smelled like marzipan. Why the hell would anybody make something so toxic smell like a nice treat to eat? I am very familiar with marzipan as my mum loves the stuff, so it was not a case of mistaken identity
Because it's Thailand.
I am not a fan of Easter.
And I am a little sick of Christians telling me "well you don't complain about having two days off". Well I say to them "as long as I get my two days in lieu for some other time of year (that I get to choose) then I am more than happy to work on Good Friday and Easter Monday" (they are public hols here in Australia and pretty much everything shuts down).
I don't like or particularly celebrate Christmas either but feel obliged to smile and celebrate for the sake of others.
Nice! Perhaps we could use it as a time to reflect on death in the Southern Hemisphere.
All it seems to turn out to be is how do I limit the amount of chocolate my four year old eats. Every second person you bump into it in the week before and after offers her eggs (ok, slight exaggeration....)
I don't like Easter much, either. My extended family went out for a buffet lunch at a casino nearby...not for me. So we spent the day doing things outside, we fenced our apple trees (they are very young, we fence them to protect them from deer nibbles) turned over the part of the garden that isn't still frozen, raked, cleaned up the yard, and so on. Much better way to spend the day for me than celebrating at a place I don't like with food I don't like, celebrating a holiday I don't believe in, lol.
I would discard it all together but like I said, I enjoy the time with the kids and as they grew up with this type of celebration long before I became Buddhist, I don't feel it fair to take it away. I will not be sad when the youngest has finally outgrown it, though. I'm just not a fan of any forced celebration type of holiday. I prefer the family celebrations that are spontaneous get togethers. I like to eat like most other people, but I really dislike forced socialization especially when they come with particular ways to dress, and here, Easter is the worst for that. I think I could do without every single holiday that we celebrate. Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Mother and Father's Days. The only one I'd keep is the 4th of July and that is because it is the most laid back holiday where we just get together and hang out outside. There is no Easter brunch outfit, no prayers at the table, no random people you don't know greeting you with "Christ is arisen!" and so on. But I do love Cadbury eggs!
I rather liked the Thai propensity to celebrate almost anybody's holiday to whatever extent they want. So non-prejudicial.
Awesome post as always @karasti. Thankfully my family on both sides don't really celebrate Easter (all athiests) so I don't feel obliged to catch up with them for lunch or dinner.
Like you said, I'd prefer to go to their place on some other weekend where we can just hang out together and my mum doesn't feel obliged to spend all day in the kitchen cooking twice as much food as is required! That seems to be the way we celebrate Xmas in the Western World anyway (unless you're a Christian and it may have some spiritual significance too).
Stopped by the local Greek Orthodox church for agape vespers today. Got a dyed egg and some bread. Pretty cool.
I made a wonderful Easter Sunday Roast Lunch for my H and our fellow tenants. took a pic of us all smiling and enjoying a really good meal together. A picture which will hopefully show the lie of our landlord who insists (in order to evict us) that the other tenants hate us, are scared and intimidated by us and wish us to go....(Fortunately we also have written sworn statements stating the complete opposite....)
(I ate no meat, just to clarify.....)