Easter 2016: Joy, Laughter, Life!

Easter makes me itch, always has. When I was little, it was the damned dress, all lace and unforgiving elastic around my chubby middle. Hair ribbons! Pulling the skin taut across the skull, hiking the eyebrows. Perfect little Mary Janes and tight-tight tights. An endless church session – drone drone drone – incense tickling the nose and sweat crawling the ribs.  It was monstrous, I’m telling you.

In adulthood, the itch has become more a thing of the mind.

Well, here it is . . . why so quiet? Really, why is nobody shouting about this back-from-the-dead thing? Shouldn’t we be?

I think we should build a huge bonfire on Holy Saturday night and just push the darkness all the way back to the horizon. We should have all our friends over and sit talking beneath the moon with a wine glass in our hands until dawn cracks the sky open.

And then . . .  bells should be ringing everywhere, joy on the very air we’re breathing; we should be delirious with it. Because – in case anybody missed the big memo – we are God’s children and, ipso facto, we are happy. Poof! There is no anger, there is no hate, and here is the big one . . . there is no fear.  Because Jesus took that package for us. He wrapped it up in blood and tears and humanity and he tossed it in our laps and said, “open it.”  Inside?

Life. There is life

We’re meant to be joyful.

So throw away the pastels. Color the day in vivid emerald and sapphire and fill it with laughter. Toss every little transitory death that has victimized you into the clean blue fire and call it good. They were never yours anyway. Don’t ask yourself what you believe, or why or how. Just believe. Wrap your mind around the incomprehensibility of Eternal Life, and let yourself be awed. Not only are you good enough - you are, by your birthright, incredible. You just have to own it.
 
In a nutshell: Easter is probably the biggest thing that can happen to us here on Earth. I think we should all stop yawning and take notice.

Roll the stone away, people. Celebrate!