Easter is not just one day, of course.  It is an entire season, lasting fifty days.  The season of Eastertide runs from Easter Sunday until Pentecost.  It could also be said that although that is true in terms of our liturgical calendar, it is true in a deeper sense to say that Easter isn't just a day or a season.  It is about how we live.

Some time ago, I served on the Commission on Ministry, the group in the diocese that assists the bishop with the ordination process.  One of the things the Commission on Ministry does is to interview applicants for ordination.  (In church talk, people applying for ordination are given a special name, "aspirants.")  Some of the questions were asked of all the aspirants, and I think they had been used for years, as I recognized several from my own interviews several years before.  After the interviews, and before we met as an entire group, each of us was to think about our conversations with aspirants, and we were given some questions to ask ourselves.  One was, "Does the aspirant exhibit an Easter Attitude?"  That question really gave me pause.  What, I asked myself, does that mean?  How would I know?  Did the Commission on Ministry have the same guidelines when I was interviewed--and did they see this "Easter Attitude?" 

I think that what we were trying to get at with aspirants for Holy Orders is the idea that our faith is not based on a "one off," an event that happened to Jesus, two thousand years ago, a one time only event in which "the good guy" won.  That first Easter changed everything.  Easter is meant to change us.  I've come to believe that the key to that change is found, at least in part, in the gospel reading set for this Sunday, from the 13th chapter of John.  Jesus is at that last supper with his disciples.  He has washed their feet, told them that they must serve others in that kind of self-giving way.  Jesus has blessed the food and fed his friends.  Judas has just left, walking out into the night to set in motion the events that will lead to Jesus' death; and so, sadly, Judas misses what Jesus has to say. 

Jesus tells the disciples about the glory of God, and then he gives them a new commandment: that they are to love one another.  "Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another."  Jesus goes on to tell them that the way people will know that they belong to Jesus, that they are disciples, is by their love.  The world will recognize them by the love they show.  The events of Easter would show them that Jesus was talking about a fierce kind of love, a love more powerful than anything, even death.  That was the kind of love Jesus meant when he told them to love one another the way Jesus loved them. 

Christina Rossetti is among the most important poets of the 19th century. Her father was an Italian poet and professor, who came to England as a political exile from Italy; her mother was a scholar in her own right, and was acquainted with Lord Byron.  She was youngest of four children.  Her brother Dante was a writer and painter, who became fairly prominent as part of a group of fellow painters called the "Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood."  Though Christina Rossetti suffered ill health for much of her life, she carried on a lively conversation through letters and visits with Dante's social circle of artists and writers, and though she lived a fairly cloistered life, she produced a prodigious quantity of poetry. 

Rossetti had a nervous breakdown when she was only fourteen, and she suffered depression for the rest of her life.  She may also have had tuberculosis, and certainly had lung ailments that debilitated her for long periods.  Despite, or perhaps because of these challenges, she turned to her faith, and developed a passionate interest in Anglo-Catholic spirituality, a movement within the Church of England that sought to recover doctrine and sacramental practice of the Medieval Church.  She embraced the so-called "Tractarian" or Oxford Movement (so called because many adherents had come from Oxford University's theological training, and because of the pamphlets or tracts that they used to disseminate their ideas).  Their theological emphasis on a kind of sacramental world in which ordinary things like bread and wine are the means of God's grace and presence had a profound effect on Rossetti's poetry.

To the extent her health allowed, Rossetti tried to put her faith into practice, not just through her poetry, but through service to others.  She volunteered at a shelter for women who had been prostitutes, helping them to restart their lives, and she advocated against slavery and against cruelty to animals. 

Christina Rossetti wrote two poems that became beloved Christmas carols, "In the Bleak Midwinter," and "Love Came Down at Christmas."  Much of her poetry reflects on love and intimacy with God; over 500 of her poems were devotional, and related to liturgy and the church year.  Some of her most beautiful poems are "dialogues" with Christ.  In "A Better Resurrection" she wrote:

My life is like a broken bowl,

A broken bowl that cannot hold

One drop of water for my soul

Or cordial in the searching cold,

Cast in the fire the perished thing,

Melt and remove it, till it be

A royal cup for Him, my King:

Family camp will be held June 27-30 at 
the Barbara C. Harris Camp in 
Greenfield, NH.   This year's theme is Peace, Love & Jesus.  Families are invited to come and learn ways that they can work together
as a family to promote peace and justice
in the world.  Time for conversation and
fun is offered for all ages.  For more information go to http://www.diomass.org/event/family-camp-2013.

Chuck and Ginny Barthel, Dorothy Brown, Nancy Campara, Christine Camper, George Chace, Betty Fraser, Gloria Graves, Bernice Herrick, Allan Johnson, Deborah Katt-Lloyd, Lisa Kimball, Robert Knoettner, Mary Anna Krause, Tony Lopes, Carole Lutton, Maureen Manzelli, Jim McCallum, Lynn McDonald, Rheta C. McKinley, Sara O'Brien, Rhonda O'Keefe, Eleanor Schott, Kevin Smith, Ralph Ventola, Stephen Wagner and Ashley Westerman.