I wonder whether we can remember how we were feeling 3 years ago as we approached Easter? Lockdown feels a long time ago, however I was reminded through an article read recently that we have all experienced a major trauma in our lives which we have somehow lived through. Our thoughts remain with those suffering from loss and the effects of long Covid yet for the majority of us we have just got on with life, seldom perhaps thinking about the changes we were determined to make then, for the better now.
Easter too can be dulled by familiarity, cream eggs and hot crossed buns are no longer seasonal, yet as with Covid, entering into the annual desolation of Holy Week, and emerging joyfully on Easter Day changes us. Each year, I try to take some time, usually on Maundy Thursday evening, to look back prayerfully at my life with gratitude and ahead with hope.
The events of the first Easter changed the course of history, as death was defeated and life in all its fullness was made available for all of us, for all time. Christ promises to walk with us each day, as he did three years ago, into the darkness, into the unknown, and we are called to be transformed, to change as a result. We learn lessons too by looking back, perhaps we wouldn’t do things now as we did then? Traumatic events draw us to our senses, yet when life gathers pace again, the bird song we heard, or the neighbour we visited, or the still small voice, all get lost.
Holy Week gives us the gift of drawing breath, of feeling God’s healing touch of love once again. Let’s allow ourselves to once more be turned upside down by Christ’s passion, and to live life differently as a result.
Bishop Karen