Celebration of Spring

Easter, and the Rites of Spring

Whatever else you think of them, those early Christians were brilliant marketers. They took the ancient pagan festival of Saturnalia and turned it into Christmas, and then they gave us Easter, which is really a lightly disguised celebration of spring, something virtually every civilization has. Remember, they aren’t celebrating Christ’s death, but rebirth and resurrection, which is the definition of spring.

For me, the beginning of spring is the day the first forsythia blossom opens. It may be the first robin or a chocolate bunny for you, and that’s equally valid.

By the way, I’m not disparaging either Xmas or Easter. I’m a cheerful atheist of weak Protestant lineage living in a largely Jewish milieu, and I love both these pagan celebrations, along with virtually every other holiday in which wonderful people feed me yummy food. By the way, you should note that the Puritans and some other Christian sects rejected celebrating both Christmas and Easter, possibly because they were mostly against anyone being happy.

Today, they’ve become almost secular national holidays, and anything that brings people together to celebrate anything is usually a good thing.

Anything, that is, other than war and hatred. Driving around Detroit the last few days, and visiting restaurants and stores, it suddenly struck me that virtually no one, apart from Muslims in places like Dearborn, is more than dimly aware that we are waging a savage undeclared war with Iran, a war we started without any direct provocation. That’s beyond outrageous, and in the long, or maybe not-so-long run, we’ll pay for it.

While it’s possible for Americans to totally ignore this war, it certainly isn’t possible for the Iranians. We should feel guilty about this, and even more guilty that we elected a man who had already proven he is thoroughly unfit for the job.

But it is spring, and that always means hope, and renewal, and a new chance to get it right. Oddly enough, it is my 74th birthday. I was born into a world dominated by two other monsters, Joe McCarthy and Joe Stalin, and they’ve long been discredited and gone. When I was exactly half the age I am now, the Berlin Wall still stood and Eastern Europe was in the grip of soul-destroying Communism.

Those things were all soon gone too. Here’s to a better year than we expect.

Jack Lessenberry

“Politics and Prejudices and other musings”