I attended an
Easter service this year, dragged unwillingly to a
Catholic house of worship by my fiancee's parents. We were visiting their house and childhood
expectations transfer from
biological children to new additions to the
family. I sat with a sense of
bemused detachment from the service, seeing all the little differences
betwixt the
United Presbyterian services from my childhood
memory, and the
pomp and
ceremony of a
Roman Catholic mass. It was intriguing.
As I
faked my way through the
sign of the cross and kneeled and stood at the appropriate times, often transfixed on the
majestic stained glass windows not far from my seat, I saw a fresh faced young
nun preparing for
Sunday School. Seeing as it was Easter, small treats for the children waited. I felt that it was kind of
pagan for churches to give in with the
chocolate bunnies and jellybeans, but to each his own. My fiancee's
sister had brought her two little girls to the church and they knelt on the
pew, coloring with
crayons and
rabble rousing. Off they went at the appropriate time, following the
Asian girl in the
grey habit.
The service slogged through the next few minutes,
same old same old, and it came time to leave. The girls came back smiling, a
Ziploc bag of
jellybeans with a little poem in it clutched in their hands. I held the bag for the oldest
girl as she put her shoes on the
right feet. The poem listed the colors of the beans and what they stood for in relation to
Easter.
Red was the
blood of
Christ on the
cross.
Yellow was the
sun shining down.
Green had something to do with
grass. All cute and cuddly. I read down the paper to
black and I smiled a
crooked smile. An
in joke? A nun with a sense of
humor?
Black is the color of
sin, which
Jesus died for. That's why the black jelly bean is not
sweet like the others.
Don't say a didn't
warn you.