Easter Is About More Than Just Bunnies And Eggs
REPORTED BY DIANA SANDERS

Easter is approaching, heralded by an array of colored eggs and pink, blue and yellow bunnies. But while Easter has become the secondbiggest day for candy consumption, exceeded only by Halloween, the day is the most sacred in the Christian calendar. Christians all over the world will celebrate the Resurrection of Christ after his arrest, torture and execution.

In the United States alone, 83 percent of the population identifies itself as Christian. However, not all Christian denominations celebrate Easter the same way. The most significant differences lie in the very day Easter is celebrated.

For several decades, Easter was celebrated on a Friday, Saturday or Sunday. Finally, in A.D. 325, the Council of Nicaea, convened by the Emperor Constantine, issued the Easter Rule: Easter should be celebrated on the first Sunday after the first full moon on or after the vernal equinox. Constantine also decreed that the cross be adopted as the official symbol of the Christian religion. Occasionally Eastern Orthodox and Western Christian churches celebrate Easter on the same Sunday. The Eastern Orthodox Church follows the Julian calendar, while Western churches use the Gregorian calendar.

The Easter bunny can be traced to the Anglo-Saxons who worshiped the goddess Eastre through her earthly symbol, the hare.

The custom of Easter came to America with the Germans who immigrated to Pennsylvania in the 18th and 19th centuries. It was not until after the Civil War that the nation as a whole began a widespread observance of Easter, led primarily by Presbyterians. Today's Easter bunny is usually chocolate or marshmallow and enjoyed by many.

As far as the Easter egg is concerned, eggs in general were seen as a sign of birth and resurrection in many cultures of earlier times. The springtime exchange of real eggs-white, colored and goldleafed was an ancient custom created by the Egyptians and Romans. Only within the last century were chocolate and candy eggs exchanged as Easter gifts.

A parable tells that Simon of Cyrene, who helped carry Christ's cross to Calvary, was an egg merchant and upon returning from the crucifixion he discovered that his hens' eggs had miraculously turned a rainbow of colors.

Easter eggs can be decorated simply with a rainbow of colored dyes or they can be as fanciful as a fabulously expensive Faberg egg, named after the goldsmith Peter Carl Faberg who was known to have produced 53 gold, diamond, and enamel eggs for Czar Alexander III of Russia as gifts for his wife.

The sanctity of the resurrection is still at its height today, and the pastel colored sweets and toys are observable symbols of the rebirth and redemption that Easter represents.

The article "Easter" was compiled by hdcnyc.com.