Easter eggs and stables!

From the Manse...

When did you see your first Cadbury's cream egg this year? I saw my mine in a supermarket petrol station the day after Boxing Day. Talk about not letting the grass grow under your feet!

While we were still singing our Christmas carols, the shops were making sure they were ready for the next commercial opportunity. Now Valentine's Day and Mothering Sunday are safely past, the number and range of Easter eggs is readily increasing and we are being overwhelmed by the shape, size and variety on offer.

On the one hand, it seems somewhat incongruous that the eggs should be on the shelves before the turkey carcass is fully carved, yet on the other, we are being reminded that Easter and Christmas are so intimately linked and part and parcel of the same story that perhaps it is not as odd as it first appears.

Steve Turner in a collection of his poems entitled "Nice and Nasty", writes:
Christmas is really for the children.
Especially for children who like animals, stables, stars and babies wrapped in swaddling clothes. Then there are wise men, kings in fine robes, humble shepherds and a hint of rich perfume.
Easter is not really for the children
Unless accompanied by a cream filled egg.
It has whips, blood, nails, a spear and allegations of body snatching.
It involves politics, God
and the sins of the world.
It is not good for people of
a nervous disposition.
They would do better to
think of rabbits, chickens
and the first snowdrop
of Spring.
Or they'd do better to
wait for a re-run of
Christmas without asking
too many questions about
what Jesus did when he grew up or whether there's any connection.

Without Christmas, there can be no Easter; without Easter there would be no resurrection.

Happy Easter to you all.

With love and God Bless

Keith