4.22.2011

Why Do People Think Jesus DIED on Easter?

So it hasn't been that long since my last post. But, I had to make this before it was too late and the idea was still fresh in my mind. Oh, and for future reference, when I introduce a new character/a new attribute to a person that's already been introduced, I will do as such:
Person - Person likes pie.
Anyway, let's get on with this post.


This past week was Holy Week. I think every day has a name, but I'm Presbyterian and the only days we celebrate in our church are Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, and Good Friday. (I looked it up. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Saturday are just called Holy Monday, Holy Tuesday, Holy Wednesday, and Holy Saturday.) The Maundy Thursday service is actually my favorite service of the year because it's the only service to really evoke the emotion I should feel for my savior dying for me. You hear all the time in church, "Jesus died for your sins." But you forget the true extent of it until you go to an evening candlelight service with passionate readings of the scripture of Jesus' death and then you have to leave in silence. This year, I didn't go, for a pretty stupid reason: I didn't want to go "alone," or basically go without Presto. He has evening classes at the local community college this semester, so he basically can't do any evening activities Monday-Thursday. Annoying, yes, but he's almost done so it's all right.


Anyway, today is Good Friday. I felt it was appropriate to blog today because there was a huge uproar at my school this week. We were initially going to have today off, but it was a bad weather day, so we were going to make up a day we missed in February due to snow. (I live in central Texas, where it never snows. This year and last year it snowed for one day about 1" and we had school off. Before then it hasn't snowed since I think I was 3 or so, only iced over.) But there were rumors going around school that if your parents gave you a note or called in and said you couldn't come in on Friday for "religious purposes," then you could be excused.


To save her from public humiliation, I won't disclose who this person is in case someone who knows her reads this. Anyway, I first heard this at the lunch table. My friend says, "Hey, are you guys coming to school on Friday?"


I say, "Yeah, why wouldn't we?"


She says, "Well, it's like Good Friday or something like that, so apparently we're allowed to bring in a note and get off for 'religious purposes.' So I'm going to pretend to be religious and get off."
This alone should set anybody off. But I know this girl considered herself agnostic and actually is going through a nasty break-up with another one of my friends over the fact that he is a Christian and she is not, so she has to be pretty adamant about it. And I know this girl could sort of be considered a slacker. But she's human, and all humans are made in the image of God, so I'm not condemning this girl in any way.


BUT STILL.


Then another one of my friends at the lunch table (though I don't really consider her as a friend as more of a person I associate with since we're both part of the "geeky anime clique" at school and we have mutual friends. I can't really consider her a friend because almost everything about her irritates me. Anyway,) says, "Am I the only one that doesn't understand the significance of Good Friday?" I know this girl was raised atheist or whatever, but come on. Even atheists should know that Jesus died on Good Friday, right?


"It's the day that Jesus died."


"I thought that was Easter?"


OHMYGOSHDIDSHEREALLYJUSTSAY--


"No, that's Good Friday. Easter is when he rose from the dead. The miracle is not that he died, it's that he rose from the dead."


Then we get off onto some idiotic discussion about something to do with Christianity, and it gets awkward for me and my friend, Erinn.
Erinn - Zizi and her met in preschool and reunited in middle school. She's been going to church with Zizi for about two years now, and she's the only one of what Zizi considers her good friends (besides Preston) that is religious and goes to church.


This discussion reminds me of about a month ago sitting in Math listening to two boys talk about Easter. One said, "Isn't Easter when Jesus died?" "Yeah, I think so...wait, I think that was Good Friday." "Oh yeah..."


IWASLIKE"REALLY--

Not trying to be racist, but they were both Hispanic so I'm just going to assume that they're Catholic for my next part of this post. So, we just went over a cross unit in Sunday School these past few weeks, so I'm all educated in crossology now. One day, we talked about how Catholic churches generally have crosses hanging up with Jesus' human body still hanging on them, and in most Protestant churches they have simple Roman crosses, which is empty to signify that Jesus is now in Heaven with our Father. Preston, as always, shared his opinion on this.
Preston (AKA Presto) - Raised conservative Baptist and is very secure in his beliefs. Now goes to Zizi's church, which believes very differently from the way he was raised.
He said that this upset him, because "the miracle is not that he died, but that he rose from the dead." Hey, isn't that what I said a few lines up? Now, I don't think that's necessarily what they're trying to portray, but I can understand both sides. I think Catholics are just trying to portray Jesus dying on the cross for the same reason that I love the Maundy Thursday service: for us to really grasp how much Jesus and God love us, we have to understand the death of Jesus. And we always say that "Jesus died for our sins," not that "Jesus rose for our sins." That doesn't make any sense. Either way, no one is wrong.


So, by the time it was yesterday, half of the school was getting out of school--some for religious purposes, some probably not so much. My dad said if I stayed home I'd have to go to the Good Friday service at noon, which I'm happy to oblige to because I don't think I've ever gone to a Good Friday service. Either way, Christian or not, ignorance or not, I hope you enjoy this post and have a good Good Friday.


Next time: The average anime convention for Zizi and Co.

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