Easter

President Trump Marks ‘Separated’ Easter Sunday: ‘We’re Getting Rid of the Plague

President Donald Trump on Sunday released an Easter Sunday greeting video from the White House, during the coronavirus crisis. “This Easter will be much different than others because in many cases, we’ll be separated physically only from our churches,” Trump said. “We won’t be sitting there next to each other, which we’d like to be, and soon will be again, but right now we’re keeping separation.” Trump was optimistic about the progress made in the ongoing fight against the spread of the virus. “We’re getting rid of the plague, it’s a plague on our country like we’ve never seen,” he said. “But we’re winning the battle we’re winning the war.” Trump urged all families to celebrate Easter. “Celebrate, bring the family together like no other, we have a lot to be thankful for,” he said. President Trump said Friday that he would view Easter Sunday services online during the coronavirus crisis. “I’m going to be watching on a laptop,” he said. “Now a laptop is not the same as being in his church or being in another church. It’s not, no matter what you say.” The president said that he would watch Pastor Robert Jeffress’s service from First Baptist Dallas on Easter. First Lady Melania Trump also wished the country a Happy Easter, sharing a video of her reading an Easter story. “Happy Easter,” Melania said. “I hope you are able to enjoy this special holiday and be sure to take care of yourselves and each other.” The First Lady traditionally reads a children’s story during the Easter Egg roll at the White House. Click here to watch both the President’s Easter message, and First Lady Melania Trump’s message.

Happy (belated) Easter!     🙂

Queen Elizabeth: ‘Easter Isn’t Cancelled’, Take ‘New Hope’ from ‘Risen Christ’

Queen Elizabeth II has delivered what is believed to be the first-ever Easter message of her 68-year reign, offering a message of hope to people confined to their homes throughout the holiday by the coronavirus pandemic. The 93-year-old monarch — who also serves as Supreme Governor of the Church of England — recorded this message in the drawing room of Windsor Castle, where she is herself in self-isolation as a result of the pandemic. The Queen recalled how “many Christians would normally light candles together” on Holy Saturday, the sombre day preceding Easter Sunday when Christ lay in his tomb — and, according to Christian teaching, descended into Hades and preached to the dead. “This year, Easter will be different for many of us, but by keeping apart we keep others safe,” the Queen said. “But Easter isn’t cancelled; indeed, we need Easter as much as ever. The discovery of the risen Christ on the first Easter Day gave his followers new hope and fresh purpose, and we can all take heart from this,” she added. “We know that coronavirus will not overcome us.” The Queen’s Easter message can be viewed or read in full by clicking here:

Happy Easter!    🙂

6 Christian Communities that Can’t Practice Their Religion Freely This Easter

As Christians around the world prepare to observe the holy weekend of Easter, many will be asked at their services to pray for the persecuted around the world. After years of advocacy groups raising awareness, the plight of the Christians of the Middle East, particularly in the former Islamic State territories, has become common knowledge among American Christians. Yet they are far from the only group that will celebrate Easter this year in defiance of state persecution, mob violence, and repressive cultural norms imposed by groups threatened by the spread of the Christian faith. Click here for a list of six countries where Christians struggle to practice their faith freely against systematic institutional and cultural pressure.

And this is nowhere near the full list.  It doesn’t even mention N. Korea, where the practice of Christianity is punishable by death.

6 things you didn’t know about Peeps and Cadbury Eggs

Each spring, the candy aisle is awash in an abundance of seasonal sweets, the most well-known being (arguably) Cadbury Creme Eggs and Peeps. But then again, are these candies really that well known? Sure, most of us are familiar with the gooey mouthfeel of a pastel-pigmented Peep or a fondant-filled egg, but there’s so much more to these adorable treats than sugar and empty calories. For instance, did you know there’s a very logical reason why Creme Eggs aren’t available year-round? Or that your children might soon be begging you to take them to a feature-length film about Peeps? Click here to read about six silly things you never knew about your favorite seasonal candies.

Pakistan prime minister vows crackdown on terror following Easter bombing that killed 70

Pakistan’s prime minister on Monday vowed to eliminate perpetrators of terror following the Sunday suicide bombing that targeted Christians gathered for Easter in the eastern city of Lahore, killing 70 people and injuring around 300. In response to the attack, the military reportedly arrested dozens in raids in eastern Punjab, where several deadly militant organizations are headquartered. And in Lahore, forensic experts sifted through the debris in the park where the suicide attack took place. The bomb had been a crude devise loaded with ball bearings, designed to rip through the bodies of its victims to cause maximum damage, counter-terrorism official Rana Tufail said. He identified the suicide bomber as Mohammed Yusuf, saying he was known as a militant recruiter. Meanwhile, Pope Francis condemned the deadly bombing, urging prayers to God to “stop the hands of violent people sowing terror and death.” The pope, speaking to the faithful in St. Peter’s Square, said many of the victims were women and children and that Pakistan should “make every effort to restore security and serenity” to Pakistanis, particularly religious minorities in the largely Muslim Asian nation. Ahsanullah Ahsan, a spokesman for the breakaway Taliban faction Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, which has sworn allegiance to ISIS, told The Associated Press late Sunday that the suicide bomber deliberately targeted Christians celebrating Easter in the park. The mostly-Muslim country has a small Christian community, accounting for less than two percent of Pakistan’s total population. The same militant group also took responsibility for the twin bombings of a Christian church in Lahore last year. But most of those killed Sunday were Muslims, The Associated Press reported. Of the dead, 14 have been identified as Christians, Lahore Police Superintendent Mohammed Iqbal said. Another 12 bodies have not yet been identified, he added.

Just awful..  To read the rest of this article, click on the text above…

Opinion: The Left’s Tired War on Easter

“Jesus is a MYTH” blasted the Daily Mail on Good Friday, right in time for the celebration of Christians’ most sacred feast, Easter. Just last November, the same publication was reporting that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene and had children by her. Christians by now are used to the mainstream media’s yearly attacks on their faith, usually timed to coincide with the primary Christian holy days, such as Christmas and Easter. It matters little how hokey and historically improbable the claims, as long as they undermine some basic tenet of orthodox Christianity, the media seem willing to entertain them. During Holy Week, an article appeared online titled “The Passion of the Bieber: A Star Attempts to Resurrect his Career,” featuring an iconographic image of Justin Bieber nailed to the cross and bleeding from his hands, feet, and side. The piece revealed spectacularly bad taste, as well as a blatant disregard for the sensibilities of Christians, who seem to be the only unprotected group left in America. The “Jesus as Myth” essay picks up on an old hypothesis that gets dusted off every few years for an unsuspecting public, purporting to offer “new evidence” that Jesus Christ never existed as a historical figure. It stacks up right next to stories of the finding of Jesus’ bones, the “married Jesus” theory and the “Jesus didn’t found Christianity, Saint Paul did” proposition. None of these theories holds much weight among serious scholars, but the media love to repeat them ad nauseam as a way to keep Christians’ feet to the fire, and of course as a way to sell magazines. The Daily Mail picks up on the proposal of atheist writer David Fitzgerald, claiming that there is no evidence Jesus ever existed. In studied seriousness, the Mail ponders Fitzgerald’s arguments as if he were an important scholar rather than the latest crank trying to make a buck by denying the historicity of the gospels. Fitzgerald says nothing that many others haven’t said before, using arguments that have already received ample rebuttal. As hard as he might try to discredit the testimony of the Roman historian Tacitus or the Jewish scholar Josephus, Fitzgerald can’t help coming across as someone who desperately wishes that Jesus never existed and so is willing to bend the historical record to coincide with his desires. The fact remains that all history requires a little faith, since no one now living ever met Julius Caesar, Napoleon, or Benjamin Franklin. We either trust the historical record or we don’t. Of course, anyone is free to invent a conspiracy theory attempting to show that George Washington never really existed, but was concocted as a larger-than-life mythical figure central to America’s founding. The difference is that the mainstream media wouldn’t bother picking up a silly story like that. If the story somehow undermines Christian belief, however, game on.

Yeah..  No kidding..  Dr. Thomas D. Williams, PhD nails it here on this Easter Sunday.

University cancels church’s Easter service

Easter Sunday is sort of like the Super Bowl for preachers. It’s all but guaranteed the pews will be packed and that presented a challenge to Roderick Richardson, the pastor of The Word Center Church in Jackson, Miss. The non-denominational church has a membership of about 1,200 people – but only 275 can fit in the sanctuary. And the preacher estimated they could have as many as 1,500 people show up for Easter Sunday. http://www.thewordcity.com/ So last January Pastor Richardson started scouting out a new location for his growing church. And it wasn’t long before he found a solution – a conference center run by the University of Mississippi Medical Center. He signed a contract to rent the space on Jan. 27. On March 27 – the university abruptly canceled the contract and told the church they would not be allowed to use their facility. “It was a week and two days before the largest service of the year,” Pastor Richardson told me. “They told me the climate at UMMC was not conducive for us to have a service at the facility.” The climate was not conducive? “They were afraid IHL might come and say something about a church having a service (in their facility),” the pastor said. IHL is also known as the State Institutions of Higher Learning, the agency that oversees Mississippi’s eight public institutions of higher learning. “We’re not angry at them because we are Christians,” the pastor said. “We’re just a little frustrated that this particular institution did not keep its word.” Marc Rolph, a spokesman for UMMC, confirmed they canceled the church’s contract – a week and two days before Easter Sunday. “It was unfortunate that the timing of the cancellation was so close to (the) date of the event,” Rolph told me. He denied it had anything to do with the church being a church. He said the booking should never have been made in the first place because they only allow their facilities to be used by health-related organizations. “The event is not health related and thus is not compliant with our policy,” Rolph said. He said they didn’t realize the church was a church until last week when the director of the facility ran it up the flag pole.

As Todd Starnes correctly notes here, I’m sure the “Great Physician” isn’t “all that thrilled with the University of Mississippi Medical Center.”  No kidding..

Blood Moon With Total Lunar Eclipse & Eerie Biblical Message Rising Over U.S. Easter Weekend

Get ready to feast your eyes on an extra special and rare total lunar eclipse Saturday morning that has some Christians worried this Easter weekend. For the third time in less than a year, the moon will dip into Earth’s shadow, turning its bright white globe a deep coppery red in a matter of minutes. The action begins at 4:16 a.m. MST on the morning of April 4 when the edge of the moon first enters the amber core of Earth’s shadow. For the next hour and 45 minutes, Earth’s shadow will move across the lunar disk, ultimately covering the entire moon at 6 a.m. MST. The total phase of the lunar eclipse will only last about 5 minutes, making it the shortest lunar eclipse of the century on the morning of Easter Vigil, traditionally observed as the period between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. The eclipse also falls within the first night of Passover, observed by Jews worldwide beginning Friday at sunset. Some total eclipses last for more than an hour, in this case, totality spans just 4 minutes and 43 seconds since the moon will be skimming the outskirts of the Earth’s shadow, rather than passing centrally through it. The moon’s red tint is caused by the Earth covering the sun. This red light from the rim of the Earth then beams onto moon, transforming it into a giant red orb. Lunar eclipses usually come in no particular order, but sometimes the sequence is more orderly. When four lunar eclipses are all total, the series is called a tetrad. This Saturday will be the third of four total eclipses in the 18-month long tetrad series. Previous eclipses occurred on April 15, 2014 and. Oct. 8, 2014. After Saturday, the next one is expected on Sept. 28, 2015. Such a closely-spaced succession of eclipses is a fairly rare occurrence. Some Christians believe the blood moon lunar eclipse tetrad could be connected to Jesus’ return — or signify a world-changing event about to take place. According to the King James Bible, “The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the Lord comes,” (Joel 2:31). Regardless of your religious beliefs, it will be a breathtaking spectacle you’ll want to wake up early to see. Just make sure to be outside no later than 5:58 a.m. MST to watch the transition.

Very cool!! Can’t wait to see it! 🙂