For some folk it's a holiday when the Easter Bunny visits, much as Santa Claus does at Christmas. It's also the time for eating lots of eggs which have been scattered by the Bunny.Easter Eggs, the symbol of fertility and new life, are easily the most identifiable symbol of the holiday. Eggs are an Easter custom that date back to Pagan times. The bright colors that adorn the eggs symbolize the sunlight of spring and celebrate the equinox.
English speaking cultures seem to prefer sweet stuff, like chocolate eggs and cakes. I defy anyone not to drool at the mere thought of a Cadbury's Chocolate Creme Egg.
Or put them together, and I don't advise this, bake a Cadbury's Chocolate Creme Egg Cake.For others, it's the holiest time of the year.
The pagan spring celebration of birth and fertility, transformed nowadays into the gluttonous consumption of Easter eggs, has for most people supplanted the three most important days of the Christian calendar. The surviving faithful, particularly the newly converted who were attracted in the first place by the security offered by faith, feel undermined by the disregard of what to them is most important, and not just at Easter.
For some Christians, the response is a retreat to a militant orthodoxy. They are not alone. Most world religions now support a radical or fundamentalist wing that reflects not a pre-determined instinct for intolerance so much as a fearful reaction to the 21st century, to cultural globalisation and commercial imperialism backed by military strength.
To tolerate the intolerant, to accommodate the unbending, is the greatest challenge facing the defenders of a secular society, one that rejects a role for religion in the state.
Fundamentalism is a modern phenomenon, where sacred texts are imbued with a single interpretation. Every faith is vulnerable, every continent is affected.
Quite.
Postscript
Save this link for next week: The 10 Best Things To Do With Leftover Easter Eggs.
Okay. Easter is over. A good time was had by all. There were chocolates and grand style feasting, and of course, Easter Eggs. Lots and lots of Easter Eggs. So many Easter Eggs.
But what are you left with after the bunny goes home? A couple of extra pounds from all the chocolate, a pile of brightly colored egg shells and lots and lots of hard boiled eggs.
Personally, I thought there was only one thing you could do with leftover Easter Eggs and that was to eat them.
