He is Risen Indeed! -- A Checklist

Tomb empty . . . check

Gardener/angel/risen one in place . . . check

Visage changed/wounds intact . . . check

Bread broken/recognition had . . . check

Women alerted . . . check

Men told . . . check

Bonnets and bow ties in place . . . check

Eggs colored . . . filled . . . hidden . . . chocolate had . . . lilies in bloom . . . sun shining . . . ham in the oven . . . family gathered . . . church bells rung . . . greetings exchanged . . . story imagined and reimagined . . . table fellowship had . . . check, check, check, check, check, check, check, check, check and check . . .

Yep . . .

He is risen . . .

He is risen indeed!

Sandra's Last Easter

It is Easter . . . when resurrections are not only possible but likely, expected even . . . and last night, on Holy Saturday . . . the day when Jesus descends into the bowels of the earth to seek out all who had gone before him before God does the divine work of resurrection this and every Easter Sunday . . . it was last night when beloved wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, aunt, cousin, sister, friend, Sandra, died . . .

As I sat at her bedside yesterday, beholding all the indignities visited upon her poor body by medicine’s best efforts to keep her among the living, somehow what I beheld was not a sick perhaps unto death woman, but a phoenix . . . in the moments of just before . . .

Just before rebirth and rerising into its new creation, the phoenix descends into ash, out of which emerges a new beauty that holds all the ancient bird was before . . . in other words, resurrection . . .

My faith tells me that today Sandra rests easy with her Lord and that, while there is weeping here in the place we call below, for her, all is well and very well indeed.

That is an ash heap I can sit in . . . that, a place I can stand, proclaiming in confidence this Easter, as with all others, He is risen . . . and somehow, in ways I can barely imagine, let alone understand, so too is she, beloved beyond time, Sandra.

Panning Rise of the Guardians

Santa Clause May Not be a Pacifist, but the Easter Bunny Is!   (Actually, I think Santa Claus is too.)              

There’s a new movie set to be released Thanksgiving week called Rise of the Guardians.  It features an animated Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, Sandman, and Jack Frost as the ‘guardians’ of the happiness of the children of the world.

At the risk of entering the saga in the role of Scrooge, I admit that (a) while I love adventure flicks, (b) the previews of this movie bother me greatly.

I am not above some gratuitous violence in a movie, but this is a children’s movie and it uses children’s icons.

Icons are just that: symbols of something.

Santa Claus, derived from a variety of historical and imaginary figures, has his origins in Saint Nicholas, with the gift-giving tradition arising from stories about his many and secret gifts to the poor.

The Easter Bunny probably arises from pagan observances incorporated into Christian practices in celebration of Easter and the resurrection, the rabbit or the hare and the egg long having been symbols of life itself.

In Rise of the Guardian, Santa Claus is a sword-wielding warrior (modeled by the author on James Bond) and the Easter Bunny throws egg bombs and a “mean boomerang” in the battle against evil.

The problem is this: the icons of Santa and the Easter Bunny, distinctly Christian for centuries, are symbols of the nativity, the herald of peace among people, peace being specifically understood to include justice and care for the poor; and Easter is the defeat of death and the victory of life, achieved not by violence, but by sacrifice.

Mythologies teach us something.  There are important lessons brought by these icons:  care for the poor, the blessing of giving, the understanding of Jesus' advent as a gift for all humanity, God cares for children, humility as a way of life, life itself as divine gift, the certainty of the resurrection promise, to name but a few.  The James Bond lesson that the ends justify the means is a problem.

The Christian tradition recounts the battle of good and evil and the triumph of good.  These icons bear witness to that story.  It is the story of life, of courage, and of sacrifice as the ‘tools’ Jesus uses to bring about the triumph of good.

A sword-carrying Santa and a bomb-throwing Easter Bunny?

Not Good News.

To Jump or Not to Jump, That is the Question

        Sidney, the black cat I’ve inherited, sits on the arm of the couch in my office.  She stares longingly at the window, sizing up the gap between her and the radiator under the window that has long been her perch for that favorite cat past time: bird watching.
For the first time, Sidney elects not to jump.  She’s getting older and the distance just seems too far today.
I suspect it was much the same for that rag-tag group of followers of Jesus in the days between Easter and Pentecost, as they sat and waited, for what they knew not.
If it had been up to them, the jump from crucifixion to resurrection to being church just would have been too far.
Fortunately for them and for us, it wasn’t up to them.  Jesus leapt; the Holy Spirit came; and the rest is history.
I am so grateful to serve a leaping Lord!  Aren’t you?