HAPPY EASTER AND PASSOVER!

RITUALS LIKE EASTER, PASSOVER
MODERN MEANING TO ANCIENT BELIEFS

www.deseretnews.com - Millions of Christians and Jews around the world this week have been performing their respective rituals surrounding Easter and Passover. In America, surveys show fewer people may attend Easter services Sunday and fewer Jews may incorporate the religious aspects of Passover than in years past. But religion scholars say those who don't participate in religious ritual are missing out on part of the human story, and that those who do participate can find modern relevance in sacred events that happened thousands of years ago. 
Much of the ritual that took place for Christians this past week on Palm Sunday, Holy Thursday and Good Friday was developed to "make alive something which otherwise would just be on the printed page," said Larry Cunningham, a retired professor of theology at Notre Dame University.

But the liturgy and ritual gestures during weekly worship and the services leading up to and including Easter still bring the story to life for an academic like Cunningham. He enjoys how the liturgy expresses different moods and tones from the triumph expressed on Palm Sunday, commemorating Jesus Christ's entry into Jerusalem, to the sorrow and lament on Good Friday, when Jesus is crucified. "Then mass on Easter Sunday is an expression joy and rebirth" in celebration of the resurrection of the Lord, he said. But a decreasing number of people will have experienced the emotional liturgy of Holy Week and Easter this year. 
A March survey for the Catholic Knights of Columbus showed 58 % of Americans plan to attend church on Easter Sunday, down from 63 % in 2009. Another survey by LifeWay Research found 41 % of Americans plan to attend an Easter service, while 58 % of those who identified as Christians said they would be in church on Easter.

This year, Christian Easter and Jewish Passover, despite being reckoned by different calendars, coincide in the same week; as they did at the start, when Jesus went to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover seder - ritual meals conducted in Jewish homes to commemorate the exodus of Hebrew slaves from Egypt - and the events of the Passion of Christ unfolded. Matthew Brown, author of the article, says that "Millions of Christians and Jews around the world this week have been performing their respective rituals surrounding Easter and Passover, carrying on traditions developed over centuries that religion scholars say still carry meaning today." We should realize that all of these legends, traditions,conceptions of God and forms of worship ultimately refer to the same Supreme God. 

WHAT DO THE VEDIC TEACHINGS TELL US? 

When we look around the world, we cannot deny that there are different types of religions, cultures, and traditions. You have Hinduism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, or the French culture, British, Irish, and Chinese. These have been established according to time, place, and people. It also makes the world more beautiful and interesting. They all have something to offer. It is not that we need to think that they are foreign or weird. There is meaning behind their traditions and practices. ... When we come to the spiritual platform of recognizing who we are, such differing external principles are very superficial. These varying customs are no longer considered as items of difference between us. ... Therefore, all cultures around the world can work in harmony to make their contribution to the unity of the world. 

Dr Stephen Knapp (Śrīpad Nandanandana dasa) :
“Toward World Peace: Seeing the Unity Between Us All”
http://www.stephen-knapp.com/toward_world_peace_ebook.htm
http://www.stephen-knapp.com  -  http://www.stephenknapp.info/

Published by dasavatara das - "Vedic Views on World News"
http://www.vedicviews-worldnews.blogspot.com.ar/