Happy Easter: Liturgy, The Work and The Vernal Equinox

Okay, here's how it happens: I have a blog. I find out about another guy who has a blog and his name is Sean. I go to Sean's blog and there is a gal named Cora who goes by Mayden's Voyage or just Mayden. If you want to read some thought provoking stuff, go to Mayden's Voyage; if you want to see the cutest adult in braces, go to Mayden's Voyage. So I'm reading Mayden's Voyage and I see Corn Dog whose blog is titled: "Rubber Corn Dog." And on Corn Dog's blog, I see the following You Tube video. But of course, it can't just be a short post about a bunny doing something funny. This is an Annal Of Gawpo, folks. So you can peel off after the video that shows the cutest bunny trick I've ever seen (the bunny attacking the snake wasn't a trick---that was pure bunny balls!), or you can read some stuff about Easter after the show.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, THE BUNNY!:


IN HONOR OF CANDACE, A DIFFERENT BUNNY. WATCH OUT FOR THIS ONE!


DEFENDER BUNNY. DEFINITE EASTER IMPLICATIONS HERE, FOLKS:


I didn't post anything in honor of Easter on Easter Sunday. I worked on Easter. But I celebrated Easter. Wait. Let me clarify: I am continuing to celebrate Easter. And let me clarify something else: I didn't work on Easter in order to make Easter better; I worked at my job. To make money. Instead of going to church. Get it?

Easter falls on a Sunday. Which Sunday becomes Easter, Gawpo? How do they pick which Sunday to have each year's Easter fall upon, Gawpo? Well, I always assume that if I know something, then everyone knows it too. So those of you who were aware of the celestial formula, please pardon the appearance of the pejorative. It goes like this (but only in the Western Christian Church, not the Eastern, and I presume, not in the Northern or the Southern, either): Easter always falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Vernal Equinox. "Equinox," you might have figured rather easily out, means "equal night." Just look at the word. Simple. It's like "what's HUD spelled backwards" it's so simple. Now I don't know what the word "Vernal" comes from, but I would hazard a guess that it has something to do with "green" or "verdant" (which has something to do with green, doesn't it?). I'll cheat Google'y later.

Now for the liturgical implications of Easter. If you are an espouser of Christian belief, you buy into the rumor that a man got dead at the hands of other men and then, after three days of still having gotten dead, got alive. But no one ever talks about those three "tweener" days. I'm sure there are books and articles, but I haven't read them. This is not the place or the blog for further speculation.

The resurrection narratives have always fascinated me. Especially the one where Jesus joins two of the disciples as they are walking along the road and the two guys don't recognize Jesus until after. I love that. Makes me try harder to recognize people when I am talking to them.

But this isn't a religious blog or a spiritual post. This is just a didactic pursing of the lips about how, in the Western Church, Easter Sunday is chosen and the Easter Season begins.

With Easter Sunday begins the Easter Octave. That's right, Easter is celebrated for a full eight weeks. That is why I am not late. It's still Easter, folks. Today is only Sunday in the second week of Easter. I'm really almost still early if you look at it in a procrastinator sort of way.

And no matter what you believe, believe this: Earth IS the best planet in the whole world and you are alive on it and you are joyful on it and sad on it and hopeful on it and struggling for hope on it and you are loved on it. If you are reading this, you are probably known to me in some small fashion, and are therefore loved by me in some large fashion. This is what liturgy means literally: The Work Of The People. And the work is love. That's what St. Benedict puts forth in his
Holy Rule for monks; that's what work is for G.I. Gurdjeiff; that's what work IS. Read his Fourth Way some time. You will love it. You may even work it.

When one amateur radio operator talks to another amateur radio operator, it is called "working." You "work" each other on 20 meters. You get to know each other. You talk as much as you wish or until the band closes you down. It has its own rubrics; its own liturgy. It's Easter on the radio. It's being connected and saved from being not connected.

I work each and every one of you right here on my blog. And, being worked by you, I work. It's about the work, you know. It's about really livin'; it's about recognizing that God walks along with us as we discuss all the events that have come to pass in recent days.

Happy Easter. Hope that works for you.