Easter Traditions

Ina

Ina

Well-known Member
Location
Harris County, NE of Houston, Tx.
It seems to be difficult to hold onto traditions in today's fast paced world. Around this part of our globe, the Easter tradition I see the most of concerns finding eggs. I don't even know why we do the Easter egg hunting activity.
I miss the the big family events we had when our children were young.

I would really like to hear the many different traditions that you have, or that you might remember. :love_heart::eek:nthego:
 

As children, and with our on children, we used to boil eggs and decorate them. Then we would roll them down some local hill or grassy slope and run after them. If they survived the journey, we would the peel and eat them.

Now, we have given up any religeous beliefs and live in a very secular area. Nobody here really bothers with Easter and I prefer to celebrate the Spring equinox as more being relevant.
 

Hot cross buns for breakfast on Good Friday, fish for dinner Good Friday, Easter eggs and Easter egg hunt on Easter Sunday, this is just a long standing family tradition with no religious connotations.
 
When I was small, most of our family and relatives lived within a mile or two from each other. Family gatherings were much more common. Easter was a time for baskets, egg hunts and candy hidden around the house. Usually a large dinner was in order for all to enjoy.
Nowadays the families are separated long distances and almost impossible to get together. Just my family alone are in Maryland, New York and the state of Washington.
 
I loved Easter when i was growing up ! My mom always colored eggs, and then hid them out in the yard while I was at church. We usually had family around for the holiday, so all of the kids loved running around the yard and finding the colorful eggs, and then eating some. Once we had our fill of boiled eggs, we gave the rest back to Mom, in the hopes that she would hide them again. Sometimes, she would do that, and she enjoyed watching all of us darting here and there around the yard, and peeking in the peony bushes, and under the lilies, hoping to find those well-hidden eggs.
Of course, there was also an Easter basket, usually filled with more eggs, plus a chocolate bunny, which was always happily devoured.
As I got older, I enjoyed helping to make the Easter eggs, which we ate most of the rest of the week. By then, we were seriously tired of hard-boiled eggs. I think now, most kids just get candy eggs, which are no where near as healthy for them to be eating.
We always went to my Grandmothers for Easter Dinner, and that was a great part of the day, as well. Pretty much Easter just goes by as another Sunday in my life now. My kids are long since grown up , and no grandchildren here to make an Easter basket for; so it is just a quiet day at home for me.


HappyFlowerLady
 
I never liked Hot cross buns. Last week I was having coffee with an American friend and she served up a home made hot cross bun. Out of politeness, I ate it - but I still don't like them!! (I think it's the texture rather than the flavour.)
 
We always dyed hard boiled eggs, but I don't ever recall a hunt of any kind involved. Except for seeing the eggs in pretty colors, I didn't like hard boiled eggs or the smell of them. The rest of my family at them for a week afterwards. I always got a small Easter basket with a milk or white chocolate rabbit in it, that was my favorite. We went to church as usual, and usually had a special dinner with close family that lived nearby. I'm not religious at all anymore, and I don't do anything now out of the ordinary for the religious holidays.
 
We went to church on Good Friday and Saturday was a quiet day. On Sunday, we always had a huge ham with all the fixings. Extended family came over. I always received an Easter basket filled with goodies and some toys.
 
Thank you everyone for your memories. They were pretty much like mine. I really thought there would be a lot more variations of the tradition. I also thought I'd finally find out how the bunny rabbit and egg thing came about. Oh well, maybe some say I find out.:tongue: :bigwink:
 
There is another thread wishing everyone Happy Easter which I find incongruous.
Not wishing to derail that thread I will comment here instead.

As a child, Easter to me was just about chocolate eggs and an extended family dinner where we ate roast chicken. In those days roast chicken was a feast and it only occurred at Christmas, New Year and Easter Sunday.

Later, as an adult the religious significance of the Easter season became more meaningful to me and I entered into the emotions of the Last Supper, the cruelty of night of the arrest of Jesus in the garden and his condemnation and execution. These emotions are anything but happy. Rather than one historical event over and done with long ago I see reflections and echoes of the crucifixion story throughout history right up to the present time. Human ugliness is very confronting and I realise that if I were alive in Jerusalem way back then, most likely I would have either joined in the condemnation or else turned my head away so as to not see what was happening.

So now every year I spend some time meditating on the Passion. When I can I attend a Tennebrae Service on Thursday evening. This is sometimes called a service of shadows and it is very meditative, with people sitting at tables spread with simple food - lamb, unleavened bread, hommous, dried fruits, nuts etc. The only light is from candles and the readings are those that tell of the night of the betrayal and arrest of Jesus. After each reading a candle is extinguished, until finally people are left in almost total darkness and deep silence to think and pray. When we are ready, we leave silently and go home, without all of the usual chitchat after church.

The next morning is Good Friday and the service concentrates on the day of the crucifixion. This is a sad and painful service and IMO not suitable for children. It is another day for deep thinking about the meaning of our lives and what it is we want to stand for. Good Friday is a fast day, not a feast day. We have very simple meals on Good Friday, tinned tuna rather than fancy seafood.

Finally, on Sunday, the mood changes. People greet each other with acclamations of "Christ is Risen", responding with "He is risen indeed", and there are smiles all round. The children are happy and full of chocolate and once again extended family comes together for a sumptuous feast. That's where I will be this year, as I have been for many years, and hope to be for years to come.

I don't wish to be ungracious, but wishing me Happy Easter before Easter Sunday is unlikely to produce the response the well wisher is expecting. Mostly I just go blank. I'm not done with Lent yet, much less over the difficult days of Thursday and Friday.
 
Dame Warrigal, Thank you for recounting what Easter has meant for you, and your family. I too was raise with the bible version of Easter. Bunnies and eggs were not part of the religious day for my family.
But, I still wonder where bunny and egg thing came from. :anyone:
 
A good link, Seabreeze.

Easter is a variable festival timed to the Jewish Passover but in the Northern Hemisphere if tends to occur in the Spring which was the time of pagan rituals designed to promote fertility of the herds and the fields. Some of these rituals involved ritual sacrifice so it is easy to conflate the pagan celebrations with the Christian remembrance of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, however, any similarities are purely co-incidental.

To understand Christian Easter we need to look back to the Jewish Passover and the exodus from Egypt. It's the sacrificial lamb, not bunnies and chickens, that symbolise Jewish Passover and Christian Easter. It's all about freedom, not fertility.
 
Sea, Thanks for clearing that up for me. I find the history a bit ironic, since my father hated the bunny and egg tradition, and he was full German.
 


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