EASTER QUERIES AND ANSWERS Prepared by the 6th grade of the 7th Primary School of Agii Anargiri
1. How do you call Easter in Greek? “Pascha” which means “Passover”. It is the eternal Passover from death to life and from earth to heaven.Easter comes form the word “Eoster”, which was the name of an Anglo Saxon goddess of springtime. 2. When does Easter celebration start? In Greece, Easter starts the Saturday of Lazarus (the Saturday before Palm Sunday) and schools are closed for two weeks.
3. When does The Holy Week start? It starts after “Palm Sunday” and runs from Monday, where fasting and observance lead up to the so-called “Passion”.
4. What do we do on Holy Tuesday and Holy Wednesday? Holy Tuesday is devoted to scripture reading and Holy Wednesday to the anointing the faithful with holy oil.
5. What do we do on Holy Thursday? In the morning we dye eggs red, the taking of communion begins in which all the faithful participate and priests read bible passages from the Last Supper.
6. Why do we dye the eggs red? On Holy Thursday, we dye eggs red to signify the blood of Christ. On Easter Sunday; we rap our eggs against our friends’ eggs and the owner of the last uncracked egg is considered lucky.
7. What do we do on Good Friday? On Good Friday, the bier of Christ is decorated with gold cloth and fresh flowers., The faithful go to church, bow and stoop to kiss the symbolic body of Christ. After this, the bier is carried out of the church and paraded through the streets in a lengthy funeral procession.
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8. What do we do on Holy Saturday? The ceremonies come to a close as people begin to break their fasts, savoring specially prepared dishes like 'margeiritsa' soup, made of lambs innards. The rest of the day is spent preparing for next day's big lamb feast at the Easter Sunday celebrations.
9. What happens at midnight? We go to church. At 12 o’clock the Holy Light is distributed to the faithful by the priest. Fireworks and crackers light the sky. We kiss each other and say: “Christ is risen”. We also give Easter wishes. Then we crack the eggs. We also light candles and carry the light back home. With the candle’s smoke, we make a cross on top of the entrance and then light the oil candle before the icon-stand.
10. How do we celebrate Easter Sunday? We eat spit/roast lamb and “kokoretsi” made by lamb’s innards. We sing, dance, drink wine and crack eggs. It is also time to eat Greek easter bread, decorated with a red egg in the middle.
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