Christians around the world have already begun celebrating Easter with various traditions. Although the central focus for all Christians is on Jesus Christ’s Resurrection as recorded in the New Testament, traditions vary among faith traditions in how the holiday is celebrated each year.
The following is a sampling of how several different Christian denominations commemorate the life, death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ during the Easter season.
While many of the traditions may follow churchwide standards, variations also exist among local congregations as directed by local leaders.
Eastern Orthodox
Eastern Orthodox Christians refer to Easter as "Pascha" and begin their observance with Great Lent. This is a 40-day fast from all meat, meat products, dairy products, fish, olive oil and alcohol.
Father Paul Truebenbach, the pastor of Saints Peter and Paul Antiochian Orthodox Church in Salt Lake City, said this fasting is both a beautiful gift to Christ and beneficial to the person who is fasting.
“When we fast, it sets everything right,” Father Paul said. “The soul is what needs the most health, and so fasting is always supposed to be accompanied by greater prayer. … The body is there really just to serve the soul, and the soul is there to serve God.”
Father Paul said the focus in the Orthodox Church during this time is on having a sense of joyful sorrow. During Great Lent, the sorrow is amplified, while during Pascha, the joy is amplified.
Many Orthodox Christians will worship with special readings and hymns on each day of Holy Week. Father Paul said this week is what he looks forward to the most.
“Some services run two to three hours long,” Father Paul said. “They’re incredibly beautiful services that we only do once a year.”
The crowning event begins with Pascha on Saturday night, with a vigil in which the church is darkened. Everyone lights candles, and a procession proceeds around the outside of the church. As the procession returns inside the church building, they declare that Christ is risen.
“And from then on, it’s a very triumphal and really joyful service,” Father Paul said.
After the Pascha service ends — in the early morning hours — worshippers will break the fast together, eating meat and dairy for the first time in over 40 days.
“We are basking in the Resurrection of Christ,” Father Paul said.
The best way to understand the Orthodox traditions and belief as they relate to Christ’s Resurrection is to experience being a part of them, according to Father Paul.
“In modern society, most knowledge passes from the mind to the heart,” he said. “In Orthodoxy, it passes through the heart to the mind. Everything is experienced first. So the only way to really understand just how beautiful and glorious and joyful these services are in this period is to come and see.”
Presbyterian
Ash Wednesday, which includes a public act of confession and contrition, kicks off the season of Lent for many in the Presbyterian Church. Each Sunday leading up to Easter, or Resurrection Day, is considered a mini Resurrection day.
Following a pattern leading up to Easter Sunday is helpful to remember the larger faith narrative of Christ’s Resurrection, according to the Rev. Jamie White, senior pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Salt Lake City.
“We enter the rhythm as if it hasn’t happened,” she said. “We enter it and try to live it out as best we can as a ritual so that we’re transformed by Jesus’ death and Resurrection anew each year.”
Fasting during Lent could include food or avoiding things like scrolling on social media or binging TV shows. The Rev. White said many people choose to replace whatever they’ve given up with something to bring them close to God.
“The ancient contemplatives would always say, ‘God, make me hungry for You,‘” the Rev. White said. “So I always tell people, when you are hungry for that thing: ‘God, make me hungry for You. Make me want You more than I want to feel the dopamine hit from Instagram scrolling. Make me want You more than numbing out right now with another glass of wine.‘”
Palm Sunday begins Holy Week, and many Presbyterian pastors will lead their congregations in a reenactment of Christ’s entry into Jerusalem.
“And if you’re entering with imagination, we’re retelling the story,” the Rev. White said. “And we’re trying to imagine ourselves as an eyewitness or as a disciple or as a guard.”
The Rev. White said this practice is exciting, but there is also a focus on what is to come.
On Maundy Thursday, worshippers will return to the church to celebrate the Last Supper and share Communion. Many congregations will also wash each other’s feet.
The Rev. White said they have opted in previous years to wash each other’s hands.
“It was a moving time for folks to wash each other’s hands and dry each other’s hands and try to mimic that service,” she said. “Remembering that God came to serve and sacrifice Himself for us.”
By the time Easter Sunday arrives, people are ready for a celebratory service, according to the Rev. White.
“There’s just something in the air that day,” she said. “You are so ready for life to come from death that you’re like, ‘Finally.’ It’s such good news to realize that sometimes things that are too good to be true are still true.”
As for why the Easter season and these traditions are so important, the Rev. White said it is one part of the puzzle piece that fits the whole story of Jesus Christ together.
“I actually really need a Messiah that has suffered but then overcame suffering with Resurrection and life,” she said. “Because that means I can overcome my suffering and my failure and all the worst things that have ever happened to me with something redemptive.”
Catholic
Catholics celebrate the Paschal Triduum from the evening of Holy Thursday to the early morning of Easter Sunday.
The Last Supper Mass on Thursday is celebrated in the evening, focused on the body and blood of Christ, according to Father Martin Diaz, pastor and rector of the Cathedral of the Madeleine in Salt Lake City.
“It’s a pattern that just sets us free,” Father Diaz said. “It frees your mind to enter into a deeper reality.”
The Paschal Vigil on Saturday night includes the baptisms of those who have been preparing to enter into the Catholic Church.
“Because the Resurrection is best symbolized in baptism and being born again as Jesus is alive again, so in baptism, we are alive once again,” Father Diaz said.
Father Diaz relates the feeling during Easter Sunday’s Mass to the joyfulness of seeing a newborn baby.
“You’re just overjoyed,” he said. “There’s a deep sense of this new life, and we do it every year because every year we need to be reminded of that. … There is no problem, war, difficulty or evil in the world that is greater than God’s new life.”
The Cathedral of the Madeleine also joins with other churches for an ecumenical walk on Good Friday to remember and symbolically participate in Jesus’ walk to the cross.
Participants will take turns carrying a cross, starting at the Cathedral of the Madeleine and continuing on to the First Presbyterian Church, Crossroads Urban Center, First United Methodist Church and St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral.
“We’re in solidarity with each other,” Father Diaz said. “It’s not an individual kind of me and Jesus, it’s really a communal celebration of life, death and Resurrection of Jesus.”
Father Diaz said he likes to focus on the joy felt during the Easter season.
“Sometimes people get overwhelmed with all the negativity of the world, … and Easter is ‘Jesus won,‘” he said. “There is no evil greater than God’s goodness and love. To me, that’s the core of it.”
Episcopal
For many Episcopalians, the first 40 days of Lent begins with Ash Wednesday. Ashes are placed on worshippers’ foreheads as a sign of penitence and a reminder of mortality. Ashes are made from burning palms from previous Palm Sunday services.
Holy Week is also incredibly important.
“I wouldn’t know how to get to Easter without Holy Week,” said the Rev. Phyllis A. Spiegel, Bishop of Utah for the Episcopal Church.
Bishop Spiegel said one of the greatest pleasures in her life is getting to talk to people who have experienced Holy Week for the first time.
“And I like to challenge people to come once in their life, because it’s never once in their life,” she said. “Once they do it, they’re hooked to come to every Holy Week service.”
Bishop Spiegel said local custom and local bishops will often decide what Holy Week services are offered in their parishes.
“And that’s kind of the fun part,” she said. “It’s got a customary norm, but within that there’s so much that you can do.”
She likes to do a “Stations of the Cross” service, which recalls the events of Christ’s life from His condemnation to His burial.
Worshippers will typically wash each other’s feet on Maundy Thursday.
“I really like everybody washing each other’s feet, because Jesus said, ‘Unless you take part in this, you have no part in me,‘” she said. “We are servants. This is about servant ministry.”
Bishop Spiegel said she often tells people they should arrive at Easter exhausted, after nightly services for several days, including Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday.
Holy Week ends at sundown on the Saturday before Easter with the Easter Vigil, which includes baptisms.
“My theology professor said, ‘This is when your child should fall asleep in the pews, they should fall asleep to the story,‘” Bishop Spiegel said.
One year, Bishop Spiegel, said a worshipper told her after that in that one night of Easter Vigil, she learned “everything I believe about God.”
She said that message is especially clear when people are invited to participate in services in some way.
“It’s harder at a place like a cathedral,” she said. “But that’s the invitation — to encounter the crucified, the betrayed and the risen Christ.”