In churches and outdoor sunrise services around the world, Christians celebrated Easter Sunday with messages of peace. Even in strife-ridden countries where peace is more a concept than a reality, pastors talked of hope. Even as Israel attacked Syrian radar bases, in Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulcher where Christ is believed to have been crucified, the Roman Catholic patriarch, who is a Palestinian, said the resurrection of Jesus is a message of hope for ending the fighting. In St. Peter’s Square, Pope John Paul II said, “Peace is possible even where for too long there has been fighting and death,” naming Jerusalem, the Holy land, the Balkans, Africa, Asia and Latin America. Among the crowd of 100,000 Romans and tourists, there must have been some from those troubled lands who wondered if they could, “Rediscover with joy and wonder that the world is no longer a slave to the inevitable.”
Even in countries where communists once banned religious practice, Easter celebrations flourished. In Moscow, President Vladimir Putin attended services at the Russian orthodox cathedral of Christ the Savior. In Grozny, Chechniyans gathered, under heavy guard from rebel attack, beside the ruins of their church for an open-air service. Priests later carried blessings to Russian soldiers at the military barracks in the city.
In Ireland, Protestants and Catholics celebrated Easter in remarkable similar services for a nation so deeply divided along religious lines.
At Whidbey Island prayers were offered at Christian churches of many denominations to celebrate the return from China of our spy plane crew members.
All over this country, Easter was celebrated in dozens, if not hundreds of different Christian churches. We marvel at their diversity, all apparently delivering the same message in similar, if not identical, services. Why so many? Why, among all the Protestant churches, do worshipers feel comfortable with a particular one? In the small mountain community where I live there are about two dozen churches for a population of less than 10,000, spread over about 30 miles. One Roman Catholic, one Lutheran and one Baptist speak to traditional worshipers. The rest seem to be leaning toward new concepts of faith, and maybe even a new ecumenicalism. The Lutheran pastor gives one service at the 7th Day Adventists church and one at the El Camino Pines Camp Chapel. The Foursquare Church meets above a restaurant; the Living Faith Christian Church and the Evangelical Free church share a business address, but meet at the elementary school; the Calvary Fellowship, an outreach of Calvary Chapel Santa Clarita, meets at the Frazier Park Community Building. There’s even a Southern California Bible Fellowship (conservative Mennonite) meeting in a residential area nearby. Their messages sound similar: “Spiritually relevant to a changing society”; “A family fellowship, Bible based and Christ centered”; “For the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry”; “We have room for you in our hearts.” One even has a Web site and touts tax deductible auto and RV donations.
I’m not sure what all this has to do with enlightenment, but very little of it is based on our cultural or religious traditions.
Nevertheless, we attended the only sunrise service in town. Billed as a combined effort of all the local churches, only two pastors actually participated. But it was held at a lovely rustic chapel in a pine forest where my daughter had been enthralled two years ago by the beauty of an Easter morning snowfall. We tried to keep our tiny candles lit in the 32 degree breeze while reading the chanted responses, “He is risen, indeed.”
My m ind wandered to the Easter mornings of my childhood at Church of the Good Shepherd, where I lit candles, made the Stations of the Cross (depicted in majestic stained glass windows) on Good Friday, and was granted absolution for my many but not very grievous sins. I was always enchanted by the profusion of fresh flowers on the altar, the solemnity of the Latin mass, the scent of incense drifting up to the heavenly painted ceiling, the marble columns and holy water fonts, the carved walnut pews and confessional doors, and the choir loft with its pipe organ that filled the huge space with sonorous chords. I sang in the choir, classical hymns in Latin, Bach and Handel.
That’s what is missing for me in the new churches, with their electric keyboards, guitars and folk songs with the lyrics projected on a screen at the front where the altar should be.
That’s why this Easter service seemed so strange to me. “He is risen, indeed.” Where were the Hosannas, the Glorias, the Agnus Dei, the hallelujahs (the ahlaylooyahs sung with such joy in my clear, childish soprano)?
After breakfast, I retreated to my room and turned on the local NPR station. Handel’s Messiah from some grand European cathedral filled the air, striking a chord, so to speak, somewhere in my deeper consciousness. I gazed out the window at my hyacinths and daffodils, not nearly as regal as the glorious Easter lilies of yore, but the effect was the same. God is in nature, in the music of the ages, and that may be the real path to peace.