What makes Easter an exceptionally unique festival in our modern world, is that it is never a fixed date in our calendar year. Easter Sunday is always the first Sunday after the full moon following the Autumn equinox. While most celebrations take place on specified dates each year, the timing of Easter still relies on the serene rhythms of nature – as do other celebrations around this time, such as Ramadan and Pesach.

Marking the beginning of Spring in the Northern hemisphere, Easter is a clear celebration of rebirth and new life. Here in the Southern hemisphere, we celebrate Easter as our Autumn or Harvest festival. Nature begins its slumber as the days grow colder and the cosmos flowers fill the fields. Leaves fade from a vibrant summer green to a spectrum of warm yellows, oranges, golden browns and reds that carpet our school grounds. Autumn is a time for reflection, internalization, and renewal for the future. While all appears to be dying, in reality the earth is preparing for revitalisation. It is while experiencing the outer dying away of nature that we are able to turn inward with innate trust and hope for new life to come.

This certainly can be a message we can carry with us during  and beyond these times – amidst conflict, devastation, poverty, disorder, and uncertainty, we are presented with the opportunity to carry ourselves with the right intentions and open hearts to find resolution in our communities. When we are able to do this, we are reassured that light shall conquer dark, and growth and prosperity will prevail.

While Easter is inherently a Christian festival, in Waldorf schools, we focus on a more universal Easter message which resonates with children and across denominations. The theme of new life in nature brings its encompassing symbols of the Easter season, which can be seen in the creative crafts emerging from the classrooms.

The butterfly bursting forth from the darkness of its cocoon; the green blade emerging from the depths of the earth; the egg, a symbol of new life with the golden sun hiding within, are all notions of great significance during the Easter period and bring expression to the picture of sacrifice, hope, resurrection, and light rising out of the darkness.  Specifically, the tradition of decorating eggs allows us to honour the ancient symbol of the cosmic egg of creation, potential, resurrection, and new birth.

The Easter hare – a solitary, wandering creature whose home changes from place to place and is known to risk its life to save others – has become a virtuous, mythical archetype, a symbol of the self which has overcome personal egotism and is capable of devotion and sacrifice. And of course, the hare brings families together over early morning egg hunts filled with joy and wonder.