I didn't do an Easter post this year. That was partly because I was very busy, and partly because I had a lot to think about relating to Easter. A couple of days before Easter Sunday, as my mum and sister were leaving the house to go out with friends for something Easter-related, my mum said 'R said something very true the other day- she said, "what's the point of celebrating Easter if you don't believe in Jesus?" and she's right, what is the point?'. It was just a throwaway comment, but one that got me thinking. After all, I'm not religious, and I don't believe in God/Jesus etc.- so why do I celebrate Easter? Though Christmas has some very strong non-religious connotations (eg, time for love, humanity, peace etc., as explained in my posts from Christmas 2012 and Christmas 2013), Easter is far more heavily based on religion, with it being a celebration of Jesus dying on the cross to save humanity etc. If you believe in that, then it's a really really important celebration- I'm not here to say it's not, or to preach about why I don't believe, or anything like that. I just realised that actually, I guess you could link Easter to new life and stuff, but not in the same way as Christmas has other meanings. There seems to be just two views to Easter- the religious view, and the chocolate view. Seeing as I'm not part of the religious view, that leaves me with the chocolate view, which, to me, felt like I was disrespecting the whole idea of Easter. For some people it is a hugely significant celebration- though it's fine for me not to believe in that, I don't think I should then replace that with chocolate. In addition, I don't want to celebrate something mindlessly, like I need an excuse to eat loads of chocolate. Both of those made my Easter celebrations feel really wrong, and I had a lot of thinking to do.
The upshot of my thoughts was that, for the time being, I will celebrate Easter. It's a family tradition, and it would cause far far too much trouble to try to opt out, plus it wouldn't happen anyway. Also, I do like it when my extended family comes together, and the time we spend together on Easter Sunday isn't overtly religious, though there is an exchange of eggs- again, something I can't opt out of without there being a lot of discussion and hassle and probably resulting in me being told that it's something I need to participate in. For as long as family traditions exist, and for as long as I am home for Easter every year, it's going to be something I take part in, even if I disagree with myself for doing that. To try and almost compensate, I guess, I've decided that for as long as I celebrate Easter in any way, I need to be respectful and go to church, even if I don't believe in what's being said. This is largely paying my respects to my mum, who likes it when I go to church, and partly my way of making myself feel less disrespectful for mindlessly celebrating something that isn't really for me to celebrate. I can't really explain why this makes it better, just for me it does. I know there are some people who would disagree with this, and say that I shouldn't go to church for this reason, but for me this is how it's going to work.
If ever there's a time when circumstances make it acceptable for me to not celebrate Easter, and my views are the same or similar to the present, then I will choose to have as little to do with it as possible. Till then, this is how I'm going to go about it.
Sorry if that made no sense, and I hope no offence was caused. Please remember that this blog is very personal, and I like the fact that it shows my views and opinions and feelings, and my growth and journeys in these. This felt like an important thing to mark for my benefit much more than for anyone else's, and therefore it was a post that had to be written.