Article March 20, 1989 Issue

My first real Easter

The resurrection of Christ Jesus is central to Christianity. It points to our own rising up out of materiality.

Carolyn Hill

My children were grown and married before I experienced what I consider to be my first real Easter. I can remember in my childhood crawling onto my mother's lap and letting tears of sadness spill down my cheeks at the thought that the kindest man on earth had been crucified. It seemed so unfair.

My mother held me close and explained that this is nor the whole Easter message. In Christian Science we look to the risen Christ and rejoice that Jesus proved, in a way people could understand, that life is not in matter or a body, but in God. It helped to hear this, but some sadness still crept in with the approach of each Easter season. My breakthrough came one year when I was struggling with a physical problem that made walking difficult. My husband and I had planned to attend church on Easter Sunday and afterward go to the home of some dear friends. I looked forward to both these happy events.

The night before was a sleepless one for me. About four in the morning I decided to get up and study the Bible Lesson^{From the Christian Science Quarterly .} that would be read in church later that morning. Doubt that I'd even be able to go to church, much less to our friends' home, tried to crowd into my thinking. And it took real efforts to turn from such doubt.