THE MADONNA OF THE RABBIT is a Sixteenth-century painting by Titian, now within the Louvre. It depicts Catherine of Alexandria being entrusted with the infant Christ by Mary, who’s stroking a small white rabbit — symbol of fertility, innocence, and purity — together with her left hand. Enchanting as the image is, one can’t help feeling that if the identical subject were painted nowadays, the Easter bunny, in all its enormous, gaudy, pink-and-yellow brightness, would tower gleefully over a diminutive Mary, crouching forlornly over her largely ignored infant.
Today, when greater than 1 / 4 of British children have no idea the Easter story, moving the main target of the celebration away from furry, chocolate-bringing mammals to an exploration of the love that God has for every of his children is an urgent but difficult task — and one which churches bravely undertake every yr. Against us is the ever increasing push towards material consumption. For us is a growing but perhaps unarticulated seek for deeper meaning and a way of purpose and direction in a bewildering world.
Beginning at the top
One advantage of presenting Easter in a fresh way is that the festival has gathered far fewer accretions of tradition and established ways of celebrating. With less pressure on “the way it’s at all times been”, opportunities for brand spanking new approaches are more plentiful perhaps than at Christmas. Easter planning begins at the top: what’s the one concept, principle, idea that you just want people to have absorbed by the top of Holy Week and Easter? In true interview-question manner, “What is your gospel?”
The underlying theme of God’s great love might be explored in alternative ways, every service, assembly, and event constructing on the others because the theme embeds itself within the spirituality of the community. Darkness and light-weight, finding God within the on a regular basis, sin and forgiveness, human and divine love, life as a journey, sacrifice and backbone — all are features of the Easter story, which, fortunately, is deep and sophisticated enough to embrace and rejoice in critical examination from every angle. Time spent refining your “mission message” for the season will likely be repaid in coherence and clarity of articulation because the season progresses.
Once your major theme is sorted, services and events might be planned around it, with prolonged metaphors coming into play, provided you don’t get overambitious and lose yourself in your personal contrivances.
Plan realistically
How much time are you planning for? Is your offering an assembly, a service, a morning?
How many persons are you hoping will attend? How many will realistically achieve this? Are they “press-ganged” (as for college assemblies) or here voluntarily?
Will your congregation be acquainted with the Easter story, or have they are available since it’s raining and all the things else is closed on Good Friday?
Each of those should have an effect, not on the basic message, but on the best way wherein it’s presented.
Don’t forget the main points
- Make sure you’ve enough helpers and that they’ve the requisite safeguarding checks and training.
- Ensure that the major food allergies are provided for, supplying gluten- and dairy- free options and a nut-free environment.
- If you’re in a church constructing check your signage: is it clear where the loos are the moment you enter the constructing?
- If you’ll be able to, provide “escape” spaces for fidgety people and overwhelmed people. Make sure these usually are not the identical space (rookie error; disastrous consequences).
- Reinforce the message that anyone is free to go away at any time. Church mustn’t be a jail (not applicable to highschool events).
Engage in as some ways as possible
Although church communities might sound a homogeneous group, they usually are not. It is our task to enable every kind of individuals in any respect levels of understanding to have interaction with the gospel, and this implies providing alternative ways of doing so. Be imaginative. Think of the person with whom you’ve least sympathy, and goal them in your planning. Remember those with physical and processing challenges: how might you make things more straightforward?
- Don’t be afraid to make use of Easter eggs: just emphasise the brand new life/resurrection side of things.
- Engage all of the senses: put scratch-and-sniff stickers on the service leaflets, or burn incense or light incense sticks. Provide several types of bread to taste or explore the entire Easter story through food. Make or find an Easter soundscape — or create one through the service, and record it to play at one other event.
- Sing songs or hymns, even in the event you don’t have an accompanist. Find ones that might be taught easily and don’t need words. Songs with actions are ideal provided the actions usually are not too silly or complicated. Avoid meaningless actions (and jazz hands).
- If you’re having craft activities, try to include something to take home and something to create together. Everyone loves a “takeaway”, and an Easter garden demonstrates to the remaining of the community that “church” shouldn’t be nearly them.
- Go outside in the event you can. Look for signs of spring, make trails or labyrinths, plant seeds (remembering on a regular basis to maintain faithful to your theme). Moving out and in of the church adds drama, and relieves the stress of sitting still and concentrating.
- Provide time to wonder. Offer Godly Play-style “I ponder” questions, either written or spoken, through the event. Invite contributions to a discussion. Display pictures of Holy Week and Easter events from different times and contexts to encourage breadth of considering. Offer different Bible translations.
- Bring a way of progression to the event. Just calling it an “Easter Journey” doesn’t make it one. Are you going to travel physically in/out/across the church? What is the corresponding mental/emotional journey? How are you going to impart a way of movement?
Remember the grown-ups
There will likely be a certain variety of events at which grown-ups are willingly or unwillingly present. These events could be their only encounter with the gospel for the yr, other than a crib service; so make it count. Have printed versions of the story at craft tables; encourage them to affix within the “wondering” and the discussions. Don’t be afraid to go deeper. If it goes above some people’s heads occasionally, that’s high quality provided it is simply temporary.
End with a strong visual
Find a picture that sums up all you need to say about Easter and focus attention on that. It could possibly be candles within the outline of a cross, a big heart, an empty tomb, an icon, or a pair of hands. If possible, draw people’s attention back to it after any hospitality you’ve offered. You could use this in your Easter publicity, and include in your presentations/services sheets.
And finally, go and tell
Modern ordination training is all about creating portfolios that display what you’ve learnt, the way you learnt it, and what you are feeling about that. We ought to be experts at this, but a lot of us fail to hold this skill into our ministry contexts. Too often, the one evidence that an event involving children and young people occurred is crumbs on the ground and sticky patches on the seating.
If you probably did a superb thing, ensure that the remaining of the church community learn about it. Take pictures (get permission first) on your noticeboard or website, speak about it within the notices or, higher still, get those that attended to report back at the subsequent all-age gathering. Big it up: display how well the budget is being spent. Leave the Easter Journey up in church, adapted in order that visitors can engage with the stations. Keep the Easter garden. Make everyone who wasn’t there wish they’d been.
The Revd Dr Sally Welch is the Vicar of the Kington Group within the diocese of Hereford.
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