Easter, Again
A Brief Message and Reminder to Raise the Living Dead
The birds have reappeared to build their nest under our eaves; while the trees have shown signs of their perennial rejuvenation that will offer shade and shelter in the coming days. Spring has officially arrived. The seasons come and go. So too, there is the liturgical cycle for some believers in the Christian faith tradition; that have led some on a Lenten pilgrimage to the observance of something commonly known as Easter.
It has always amused me that the date of such a religious observance was set by the lunar calendar and named after an Anglo-Saxon goddess, named Ēostre. Then there’s the cartoon-like, magic bunny who hides candy eggs for the children to seek and find; while more “seasoned” celebrants might tread more hesitantly with the reminder of our own mortality and any notion of an “afterlife.” But -- In one form or another -- it expresses our shared, longing hope and desire for new life to arise out of a past that is dead and gone.
But more so, it is a reminder there’s an important distinction between the gospel message and meaning about what resurrection truly means; beyond any illusory notion of any re-constituion of our mortal nature.
When Life Is About More Than a Cartoon, or Video Game
“But I (Jesus) tell you: Don’t react violently against the one who is evil: when someone slaps you on the right cheek, turn the other as well.” (Matthew 5:39)
Look around us today, all we see is death and destruction. The current occupant of the White House (my brother, Donald) recently launched a propaganda campaign to promote his bombardment of a foreign nation and assassination of its leaders; using memes to depict the blasting away of other members of the human family like a pinball machine.
Meanwhile, the Secretary of War (a governmental position formerly known as the Secretary of Defense) invoked his god to commit “overwhelming violence” against our nation’s enemies, and — quoting Psalm 3.7 — to “break the teeth of the ungodly.”
As despicable as these recent examples are, we all seem to be entrapped in the same old cyclical story of our human condition. Now, with yet another Easter proclamation’s observance, where might its message of a new kind of life be enough to raise what one might call the living dead?
A dozen years ago I wrote a lengthy commentary on the two scripture passages read on this fourth Sunday of the Lenten season (here). The prophet Ezekiel asks the rhetorical question if a “divine” message that was once dead and buried can “live again?” Then follows the story of Jesus, the Galilean peasant sage, miraculously bringing his old, dead friend back to mortal life. Lazarus’ bones may live a few more years. But is there a message that is eternal?
In the liturgical calendar of scripture readings for Easter, they they are preceded by those for Palm Sunday; which narrates Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem on a jackass, as a lampoon to the monarchial powers of this world. Then follows his arrest, detention, trial, and execution by the same; in a futile hope his life and teaching could be dead and buried.
Some Christian believers take the various resurrection narratives literally; in the hope they too might inherit something imagined to be eternal life. Alternatively, some biblical scholars and theologians offer as many non-literal explanations of what the Easter proclamation might mean for us. And then there are those who may be inclined to faithfully go to church worship at least twice a year; observing Christmas and Easter!
It’s not difficult to believe the historical Jesus was born, and later died. But it was the Galilean peasant sage’s exemplary life journey and recorded teachings that have been irrepressibly raised up; to be believed, embraced, and followed.
© 2026 by John William Bennison, Rel.D. All rights reserved. This article should only be used or reproduced with proper credit.To read more by John Bennison from the perspective of a Christian progressive go to the Archives.