Easter helps us find truths about our feelings about faith
Over the years, I think I've managed to say something about every major holiday on the calendar except one - Easter.
It is hard to write about Easter. There is nothing amusing about it. It's not even a family celebration, really, but an observance that tends to be very personal. The fact is, at Easter, and during the weeks preceding and following, we acknowledge (or perhaps try to avoid acknowledging) some of the most significant truths about our individual and collective humanity.
The truths of Easter touch us as those of no other "holiday" can. For example:
• Love as the overriding need in all human relationships.
• The power in courageously stating one's beliefs, even when sacrifice is involved.
• The fickleness of popular acclaim, and how easily it can turn to condemnation.
• The potential for betrayal and evil within each of us.
• The irony that (and my apologies to Billy Joel), "only the good" do seem to "die young."
• The excitement of a new beginning.
• The suggestion of a God who loves and forgives unconditionally.
• The possibility that this God actually acts in history on our behalf.
Of all the "Christian" holidays, Easter has most clearly retained its spiritual identity intact. Whether we believe it or not, Easter rests firmly on our acceptance of an event that does not fit into our 21st century, scientific understanding of reality. And it speaks all the more clearly (and disturbingly) because of it. The truths claimed at Easter challenge us as no other holiday themes can.
Most of us do feel a bit uncomfortable with such ideas. They hit, perhaps, too close to home; touch us too deeply.
Of course we have, in time-honored American tradition, tried to make Easter a bit more palatable by commercializing it - rabbits who deliver colored eggs, parades, new clothes, cards, family feasts, etc. But when it comes right down to it, that really hasn't worked.
Like it or not, we are stuck with a religious holiday that we can make no more and no less than what it purports to be. We can accept its claims; we can reject them; we can even try to ignore them. But we must deal with them in some way.
I hope you will risk using the holiday to consider the message of Easter and what it does, or does not, mean for you. Accept them or reject them, but the themes of Easter deserve your serious attention.
• Dr. Ken Potts is on the staff of Samaritan Counseling Center in Naperville and Downers Grove. He is the author of "Mix Don't Blend, A Guide to Dating, Engagement and Remarriage With Children."