Remembering Easter Past

Easter 1980 and 2017

The above photo is from Easter 2017. We were on our way to worship at the New Hope Baptist Church in Metuchen, where I served as an Associate Minister. On this morning, they would give their Easter speeches. Even though Joseph and I were the only ones who could fully understand what they were saying, the congregation roared in delight almost as loudly as the girls squealed on Saturday. The dresses! The hats! The bags! I loved dressing them in matching outfits, especially on Easter Sunday.

Their photo reminds me of Easter 1980 when I was four years old, about the same age as Afia in 2017. I was heading to the Grace Baptist Church in Mount Vernon, the church our family attended in the rare instances that we went to church. I was donning a hat and regaled in my Easter finery. Though not in this photograph, I had a pocketbook to match the outfit. As the kids say, it’s giving Easter parade pomp and circumstance!

The pageantry of children is my second favorite part of Easter, with the Resurrection of Jesus being the first. For as advanced as we have become, I get nostalgic thinking about little boys in three-piece suits, girls in frilly dresses and hats, speeches, parades and all of the pageantry of Easter!

Pastor Donna Olivia Owusu-Ansah