Feast + Fast: Easter Sunday

For each day of Holy Week, Christina Rees offers a reflection for our hearts and minds, and a recipe for a simple meal to nourish our bodies. All these recipes and many more can be found in her book Feast + Fast: Food for Lent and Easter

Sunday 12^th April – Easter Sunday

 

Christ is risen!

He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

This joyous cry has gone up from the lips of thousands upon thousands of believers for many hundreds of years. It is thought that Mary Magdalene greeted the Roman Emperor Tiberius in AD37 with the words, Christ is risen! It is also believed to have been used at Augustine’s baptism in Milan on Easter eve in AD 387. Whenever it was first used, it is recognised as an echo of the story of the encounter on the road to Emmaus between two of Jesus’ disciples and the risen Christ. After they run back to Jerusalem to tell the others about what had happened, they are told, ‘The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!’ (Luke 24:34)

My faith rests on the reality of the resurrection. For me it is the bedrock of my trust that life is eternal, that God’s love is the ultimate power, stronger even than death, rendering death but a necessary stage on our journey, taking us further into the heart of God.

While we cannot possibly explain the cosmic chemistry that raised Jesus out of the tomb, we can believe that the resurrection was not just a divinely conjured resuscitation, but a new kind of life, a new way of being. Paul states that, ‘If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you.’ (Romans 8:11)

Because of the resurrection, I, too, can live a new kind of life. I, too, can be alive in the Spirit, even if my body is leading me inexorably towards my physical death. As Paul writes elsewhere, quoting the prophet Hosea, ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory. Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?’ (1 Corinthians 15:55)

In the midst of lockdown, with death now the lead story every day, we can trust; yes, we all have to die at some point, but that is not the end. Death does not have the last word. The last word belongs to Christ.

***

I have enjoyed writing these blogs this past week and I am grateful to David Moloney at Darton, Longman and Todd for asking me to contribute to their online offerings. My prayer for you is that today you will be able to let go of the heaviness of Passiontide and step into the infinite joy and hope of the resurrection. I would like to end with a blessing I wrote originally thinking of women and girls who had been trafficked, but which is now for us all, as the coronavirus reminds us in new ways of our interconnectedness, our vulnerability and our shared reliance on the reality of the Risen Christ, our living Lord:

May the roots of faith grow strong within you.

May your vision of peace be like a clear sky.

May you be touched by the lightning flash of bright hope.

May you drink deeply at the well of joy.

May the love of God

Be your blanket and your pillow,

Your bed and your room,

And may God’s arms surround you

Now and forever more.

Amen.

***

Because of COVID-19, this Easter will be like no other. I hope you have enough food so that you can make a good meal, whatever it is. In Feast + Fast – Food for Lent and Easter, I suggest starting the day with something like Churchfield Eggs Benedict (see recipe below; other recipes can be found in the book); Keri’s Old School Popovers or Kathy’s Galette.

For the main meal I usually serve roast leg of lamb with a variety of roast vegetables, including white and sweet potatoes, parsnips, garlic and onions, along with steamed peas or broccoli and specially cooked savoy cabbage. Dessert is almost always my grandmother’s Pascha (see Easter Saturday’s post), which hopefully, I will have been able to make by now. Some years I also make my version of Eton Mess. I can also highly recommend Sue Jagelman’s Easter Chocolate Cheesecake, if you can get the ingredients.

 

RECIPE

Churchfield Eggs Benedict

Eggs Benedict is one of my all-time favourite meals. This is perfect to have on Easter Sunday morning. For the hollandaise sauce I always use John Tovey’s recipe for quick hollandaise sauce (see p. 90 of Feast + Fast).

Serves 4

4–8 eggs (1–2 per person)

4–8 slices of smoked ham or smoked back or streaky bacon rashers

(1–2 per person)

4 English muffins

butter for spreading

3oz/75g fresh spinach

1 quantity hollandaise sauce

Coddle or poach the eggs and grill or fry the bacon. Halve and toast the English muffins, place them on plates and butter lightly. Lightly steam the spinach or wilt it by placing in a hot frying pan for a few minutes. Layer on the cooked bacon or smoked ham and spinach and put the eggs on the top. Drown with hot hollandaise sauce.