<strong>Kwahu</strong> project 2.qxp_Layout 1 4/12/17 10:24 AM Page 3 06 04 DAILY HERITAGE FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 2017 WWW.DAILYHERITAGE.COM.GH ADVERT
WWW.DAILYHERITAGE.COM.GH DAILY HERITAGE FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 2017 Easter 2017: time to renew faith in Christ IT’S THAT time of the year again when Christians come together in one accord to celebrate Easter in remembrance of the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Easter, according to religious historians, is the culmination of the Passion of Jesus, preceded by lent - a 40-day period of fasting, prayer, and penance. Across the Christian world, the customs of Easter festivities vary. They include sunrise services, exclaiming the paschal greeting, clipping the church and decorating Easter eggs ( which symbolises the empty tomb of Jesus). In Ghana, Christians herald the festivities by observing the lent period, Palm Sunday where church members march on the streets to display palm branches, Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Sunday, also known as Resurrection Sunday and Easter Monday where the festivity is crowned with picnics. For many Christians in Ghana, Easter festivity is a time for sombre flection, family re-union and merrymaking. In <strong>Kwahu</strong> in the Eastern Region, the celebration is commemorated every year with a unique assembly of people laced with lots of fanfare and mega parties. Prior to the event, the country is inundated with advertising messages in the media to extol the arrival of the much-awaited and now famous <strong>Kwahu</strong> Easter. Hundreds of <strong>Kwahu</strong> natives, tourists and holyday-makers journey to the beautiful mountainous area to celebrate the festivity. There are, however, some social misfits who always take advantage of the assemblage of huge numbers of people to engage in criminal activities. Some ladies also wear indecent dresses in the name of fashion to the rather Christian festivity. Prostitutes also take advantage of the fanfare to engage in sexual promiscuity which has been condemned by the chiefs and people of <strong>Kwahu</strong>man. As we celebrate this solemn festivity, the DAILY HERITAGE wishes to urge all Easter celebrants to use the opportunity to renew their faith in Jesus Christ, while shying away from sinful acts which were the reasons why Jesus Christ was persecuted and died to atone for our sins. Does Easter really symbolise Christ’s death? COME EASTER Sunday, April 16, the churches in the <strong>Kwahu</strong> are expected to literally compete with organisers of entertainment programmes for the attention of the large crowd there for the Easter celebrations. Besides the regular Sunday services, the churches will hold outreach missions to win souls for Christ, in whose name Easter is celebrated world-wide. Interestingly, the commemoration of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ clashes with the promotion of immorality, which many observers associate with the Easter festivities. About Easter Easter is a festival and holiday to mark the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, described in the New Testament as having occurred on the third day of his burial after his crucifixion by the Romans at Calvary c. 30 AD. It is the culmination of the Passion of Jesus, preceded by Lent (or Great Lent), a forty-day period of fasting, prayer, and penance. Most Christians refer to the week before Easter as “Holy Week” and contains •Sermons during Easter have the death and ressurrection of Jesus Christ as the themes the days of the Easter Triduum including Maundy Thursday, commemorating the Maundy and Last Supper, as well as Good Friday, commemorating the crucifixion and death of Jesus. The meaning of Easter also symbolizes the complete verification of all that Jesus preached and taught during His three-year ministry. If He had not risen from the dead, if He had merely died and not been resurrected, He would have been considered just another teacher or Rabbi. However, His resurrection changed all that and gave final and irrefutable proof that He was really the Son of God and that He had conquered death once and for all. However, there are some who believe that Easter did not always symbolize Christ's resurrection from the dead and the meaning of Easter was quite different from what Christians celebrate today. The feast day of Easter was originally a pagan celebration of renewal and rebirth. Celebrated in the early spring, it honoured the pagan Saxon goddess, Eastre. When the early missionaries converted the Saxons to Christianity, the holiday, since it fell around the same time as the traditional memorial of Christ's resurrection from the dead, was merged with the pagan celebration, and became known as Easter. The meaning of Easter was also changed to reflect its new Christian orientation. Today, the meaning of Easter, for millions around the world, has taken a different dimension. From its traditional church-going, Easter celebration is now seen as an occasion for merry-making with a lot of activities such as carnivals and sporting activities, to mark the festivity.
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