We sang and preached about and celebrated the Resurrection of Christ. Our Sunday morning services are almost always packed, and the specialness of this day made it even more so. There were lots of folks dressed in their newest finery, with pretty pastels in abundance, hats adorning a bunch of heads, flowers on many pins and lapels, and everyone taking family photos before and after service.
And then it was time for lunch and an unexpected rendezvous with rudeness.
Our family headed to a local restaurant and was waiting for a seat. Another family came in, also dressed in suits and ties and dresses and bows, and my mother-in-law looked at the little girl and said, "That is such a pretty Easter dress!"
"We don't celebrate Easter," the father responded curtly.
An awkward silence ensued.
For those uninitiated in the minutiae of all of this, there are some who take great umbrage with the name Easter since it seems to have originated in a long-forgotten pagan feast. Without getting into historical tall weeds, due to a reference to it in Scripture and its overlapping time frame, it sort of got assimilated along the way and has for a very, very long time now been the name that people around the world know Resurrection Sunday morning by. If you ask anyone, anywhere, what happened on Easter, maybe .000001% of the population will say any sentence with the name Ishtar in it, while 99.9999% of the population will say something about Jesus rising from the dead.
To put it mildly, Easter ain't what it used to be. And yet, because of what it used to be, you will every now and again run into someone who not only does not use the term but actually gets "rude for Jesus" (Before they pray over their meal, no less!) when it is used. And that is both a shame and illogical and also really inconsistent.
The Rude for Jesus crowd will always and only use the phrase Resurrection Sunday instead of Easter. What they seem to miss is that the name Sunday is from Greek astrology and means "The day of the sun." As you might imagine, that was all about pagan worship. Likewise, Monday was "The Moon's Day." The rest of the week is no better; Tiw's day referenced a one-handed god of combat, Wednesday was Woden's (Odin's) day, Thursday was Thor's Day, Friday was Frigg's (also known as Venus) day, and Saturday was Saturn's day. So anyone who wants to get really proper about everything will need to forever and only refer to these days as the first day of the week, the second day of the week, the third day of the week, etc.
Ditto for the months of the year. January is named after the Roman god Janus, February after the Roman Februa festival, March after Mars, Roman god of war, April is likely tied back to Aphrodite, May came from the Greek goddess Maia, June the Roman goddess Juno, and July and August after a couple of pagan Roman emperors. September through December sort of get a pass; they are merely from the Roman numbers 7, 8, 9 and 10 since they were originally the seventh through 10th months of the year. But since the Romans themselves were pagans, for anyone wanting to be truly proper, you will need to start quoting your months as "First Month, Second Month, Third Month, Fourth Month, Fifth Month, Sixth Month, Seventh Month, Eighth Month, Used To Be Seventh Month, Used To Be Eighth Month, Used To Be Ninth Month and Used To Be Tenth Month.
If you were born, say, on Tuesday, Dec. 1 of 1970, then, you will need to start giving your birth date as "The third day of the week in the used to be 10th month of the year which is now the 12th month of the year in 1970."
Or, and this is just a thought, maybe everyone could just lighten up a bit and simply learn to be polite.
This kind of thing is not a new annoyance to me. Many years ago, I saw a gentleman sing a gospel song with great expertise. I also saw after the service as a person went to him to tell him she really enjoyed and appreciated it, to which the man (who did exactly as he had been taught by a seminary professor) tartly replied, "Don't glorify me; glorify God!" The person speaking the kind words to him was mortified and embarrassed. Mind you, she shouldn't have been; the singer who had been instructed in proper vocals and improper manners should have been the one ashamed of what he had done. How hard is it to say a simple thank you to a person while also breathing a prayer of thanks to God?
If I believed like that no doubt well-meaning man in the restaurant, I would have long since taught my children, "We don't use the word Easter; but if anyone tells you how pretty your Easter dress is, just smile and say thank you and pray for them."
In these and all situations like them, people of all beliefs would do well to remember that "Blessed are the snarky" is found nowhere in the Bible.
Bo Wagner is pastor of Cornerstone Baptist Church of Mooresboro, North Carolina, a widely traveled evangelist and the author of several books available on Amazon and at wordofhismouth.com. Email him at 2knowhim@cbc-web.org.