Easter and the holidays that are related to it are moveable feasts in that they do not fall on a fixed date in the Gregorian or Julian calendars. Instead the date for Easter is determined on a lunisolar calendar similar to the Hebrew calendar. The First Council of Nicaea in the year 325 established the date of Easter as the first Sunday after the full moon following the March equinox.
In Western Christianity, using the Gregorian calendar, Easter always falls on the Sunday between the 22nd of March and the 25th of April inclusive, within about seven days after the astronomical full moon.
The following Easter Monday is a legal holiday in many countries with predominantly Christian traditions.
New Zealand’s shop trading restrictions for the upcoming Easter break are quite complex. Basically shops must not open on Good Friday or Easter Sunday, but there are a number of exemptions.
For instance dairies can stay open provided they only sell items “that people can’t put off buying until the next day such as baby formula or pet food, and the quantity of goods for sale is no more than needed to meet the needs of people in the area.”
Same rule for service stations, only they can also sell petrol, oil, car parts and accessories.
Takeaways bars and restaurant/cafes must sell “only cooked food ready to be eaten immediately.” Shops for cutting hair or renting videos are exempt, pharmacies can stay open, real estate agents can sell houses and garden centres can trade on Easter Sunday.
Duty Free shops and shops that sell souvenirs are also exempt, so I guess Wills and Kate won’t have to take the next step of their journey without a genuine plastic Tiki, manufactured in China.
It’s a funny old world and there are lots of people who will carry on working without anyone giving a thought to them having a break and where exemptions haven’t even been considered. I’m thinking particularly of hospitals and hotels, taxis, bus and train drivers and caregivers to the elderly and infirm.
I assume if you die on Good Friday or Easter Sunday funeral directors won’t have to seek permission to render their services either.
It was a death on Good Friday 2000 years ago that started all this and I suppose that as we idly sit agonising over not being able to shop at the supermarket it might be an opportune time for reflection.
The judicial murder of Jesus of Nazareth is not a pleasant story. He was done to death with the connivance of the religious and secular authorities and the backing of public opinion.
After a sleepless night in which he was given no food, he endured the mockery of two trials, with Pontius Pilate reluctantly agreeing to the death sentence after his body had been lacerated beyond description and to within an inch of his life with the cruel Roman cat-o-nine-tails.
A crown of thorns was embedded on his head before He bore his own cross to the crucifixion site where He endured an excruciatingly painful death in which every nerve in His body screamed with anguish.
It was clear that the Jewish priests and most of the social elite of the day hated everything about Jesus. He saw through their pontificating and their self-important determination to maintain their status as the only dependable interpreters of the scriptures. He steadfastly refused to bow to their authority. He persisted in teaching a gentle doctrine of love that wasn’t suitable to the hard-hearted old enforcers of the Mosaic laws. His teaching threatened to weaken their positions as sanctioned flunkeys of the Roman consulate.
There is something disturbingly familiar about all this. Two thousand years on, for many the world is not a better place. Television images of some sections of the Middle East today cause you to think: has anything really changed? Israel, though just a speck on the world map, receives overwhelming attention and the surrounding states live in constant conflict.
The so-called “Arab Spring” turned into a disastrous summer of discontent.
But we shouldn’t complain. Laws and human rights based on Christian teachings have served New Zealand well as a society and we can probably endure a couple of days with restricted shopping options.
Christians believe the Easter Sunday resurrection of Jesus is not a fairy tale or a product of man’s desirous imagination, but a profound truth of life foretold, foreshadowed and carried through by God, just as He planned from the beginning.
For believers, the day the Son rose is worth constantly celebrating.
But in the Ukraine, Egypt, Syria and many other parts of this tortured planet the Christian message is as elusive as ever.
I’m told the meek held a meeting recently. They’ve decided they don’t want to inherit the earth.
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