When is Easter Saturday? Obvious? Be careful! For most, this Saturday (23rd April) is Easter Saturday. For some, this will also be St George’s Day, although the Church this year puts St George’s Day in May. This Saturday is really “Holy Saturday”, not Easter Saturday, which falls in the week after Easter (30th April). It’s the sort of trivia that could fuel a whole pub quiz, and the arguments afterwards.
All this messing about with calendars is to do with Easter itself. Easter slides and slips around our diaries because the early Christians had problems matching the Jewish calendar (based on the cycles of the moon) with the Roman calendar (based on the cycles of the sun). The Easter events happened over the weekend of 14th day of the Jewish month of Nisan. Matching that to a new calendar proved difficult for the early Christians. Even today, Western and Eastern Christians can end up celebrating Easter a month apart.
It’s important to Christians because we’re celebrating something we believe happened in history, that can be pinned down to one particular date. Easter isn’t just a happy ending for Jesus’ life. For Christians, it’s the moment when God reversed death itself. You could almost say that Christianity wouldn’t make sense without this extraordinary claim, because the faith that Jesus conquered death gives Christians hope. Hope that sin is put to death, that there is life after death; hope that love really can conquer all. It sets a pattern that a new springtime can follow winter, that God is on the side of new beginnings.
This isn’t just religious talk, because it has encouraged Christians to take new risks, to act in the belief that good conquers evil, and to work for justice and peace. Easter says “No matter how bad things get, God is on the side of those who fight to make things better.” That’s as much a message about seeking justice and peace today for the people living down the road, as it is about the spiritual things of life.
This year we seem to be heading for a real scorcher of an Easter, and wonderful weather helps us to enjoy life. But for me, I’ll mark a death on Good Friday, pause for thought on Holy Saturday, and celebrate new life on Easter Day. And I believe that God wants all of us to stand up for new life and new justice in the power of Jesus.
Then on Friday week, it’s Wedding Time. Royal or not, it is a great time to get married, because Easter says that God is on the side of all new beginnings, of all new commitments, that God is shouting for us from the sidelines. Archbishop Rowan will ask God to bless Wills and Kate: go on, ask for a blessing for yourself, and see if Easter can be a new beginning for you – and for the folk around you.
