Eostre & the Bunny

Holy Watermelon

Every spring, we celebrate the return of greenery and migratory birds, and the blooming of flowers; most animals celebrate by having lots of sex. Some of us get really religious about it.

Easter is the celebration of fertility and renewed life, and every part of the secular observance reflects this. Several gods through a wide variety of traditions enjoy individual worship in this time, many of them have a name that sounds vaguely like "Easter," including Eostre, Ostara, and Ishtar. They have been asociated for millennia with fertility, and in some cases, eggs.

At the same time, Christians reflect on the paschal sacrifice of Jesus the Christ, and the promise of renewed life. Under the influence of Imperial Christianity, efforts were made to associate the symbols so often seen during this holy season with Jesus and his mother. A lot of these combinations don't immediately make sense, but we'll dig up the details.

The accusation that Christian Easter is ripping off the "pagan" polytheistic tradition is far from true, instead it comes from Judaism in every ancient aspect--but modern traditions have incorporated ill-fitting cultural aspects of the people who celebrate it around the world.

Remembering when Easter will be two years from now is tricky, but there is a scheme to it, and the dates are predicted more than a century ahead of time. Easter is the first Sunday after the full moon after the vernal equinox (northern hemisphere). However, even among groups that stick to this scheme, there are some who don't observe the astronomical equinox, but instead rely on an ill-timed liturgy.

The Springtime Lent also has a lot of tradition around it--especially around the beginning. The time for fasting is biblical, though the practices vary from one group to the next.

All this and more...

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[00:00:11] Katie Dooley: Hi, everyone.

[00:00:13] Preston Meyer: Hi.

[00:00:14] Katie Dooley: My name's Katie.

[00:00:15] Preston Meyer: And I'm Preston,

[00:00:16] Katie Dooley: And we're the hosts of...

[00:00:18] Both Speakers: The Holy Watermelon Podcast.

[00:00:21] Katie Dooley: Thought we hadn't introduced ourselves in a while,

[00:00:23] Preston Meyer: Right? I mean, it's not much of an introduction. You said your name, I said mine.

[00:00:27] Katie Dooley: Is that not what an intro is?

[00:00:30] Preston Meyer: It depends on who you talk to.

[00:00:31] Katie Dooley: Okay, well,

[00:00:34] Preston Meyer: I have a degree in religious studies,

[00:00:36] Katie Dooley: And I don't.

[00:00:40] Preston Meyer: And together we make a fun show.

[00:00:44] Katie Dooley: Together we fight crime.

[00:00:46] Preston Meyer: We fight hate crimes. I mean, not in a terribly vigilante-style way, but.

[00:00:54] Katie Dooley: Maybe we could.

[00:00:55] Preston Meyer: Maybe we reduce hate crimes.

[00:00:57] Katie Dooley: I like that. Why aren't we talking about today? It's topical.

[00:01:03] Preston Meyer: Easter.

[00:01:04] Katie Dooley: Easter!

[00:01:05] Preston Meyer: And rabbits.

[00:01:06] Katie Dooley: And bunnies.

[00:01:07] Preston Meyer: And why anybody would ever combine the two?

[00:01:11] Katie Dooley: Also, bunnies and eggs. Also, weird.

[00:01:13] Preston Meyer: Yeah.

[00:01:15] Katie Dooley: Weird combo.

[00:01:16] Preston Meyer: Right? That's... Who decided that rabbits lay eggs? Chicken eggs.

[00:01:24] Katie Dooley: The Germans.

[00:01:26] Preston Meyer: We get to blame a lot of things on the Germans.

[00:01:28] Katie Dooley: Yeah, they're a pretty good scapegoat.

[00:01:31] Preston Meyer: Christmas is the way it is because of the Germans. Okay, okay.

[00:01:31] Katie Dooley: Yes. This episode will take a similar format to rebranding the holidays. Our Christmas episode on the pagan origins of Christmas. We're going to talk about the pagan origins of Easter. Preston actually said before we started recording that he thinks Easter is just a pagan holiday, which is a pretty powerful statement from a Christian.

[00:01:57] Preston Meyer: We'll explore that in greater detail.

[00:02:00] Katie Dooley: That's a good starter for you. So, Easter was originally a pagan celebration of the spring equinox and has since morphed into the most important holiday in the Christian calendar.

[00:02:14] Preston Meyer: I don't know if morph is the right word, but here we are. It is. It is the thing. It is both of those things.

[00:02:20] Katie Dooley: What verb would you use?

[00:02:22] Preston Meyer: I don't know. Syncretism feels close, but obviously that's not technically a verb. Syncretized would be the verb form. But that's not really exactly it either. It's a little bit. You'll see what I mean.

[00:02:41] Katie Dooley: All right. Well.

[00:02:42] Preston Meyer: So, there are a lot of spring traditions that celebrate rebirth after a long, dark, cold winter. When we start to see plants and animals emerging from their slumber. Everything turns green. And the rabbits, especially more than everything else, are visibly getting busy.

[00:02:58] Katie Dooley: Huh huh huh huh huh huh huh. I imagine that's the same rabbits making just small and adorable and fast.

[00:03:05] Preston Meyer: Rabbits are fast. Yeah. It's it's a sight. Had rabbits for a little while when I was a teenager.

[00:03:16] Katie Dooley: Nice. I have some friends that own rabbits. Yeah, yeah. This idea of rebirth will eventually be tied into the resurrection of Jesus.

[00:03:25] Preston Meyer: Yeah, it seems like it should be a natural sort of transition, and yet it really never ended up being any reasonable, sensible transition. We just still have the old tradition and the new one.

[00:03:25] Katie Dooley: Yeah, it doesn't blend quite as nicely as Christmas did.

[00:03:45] Preston Meyer: No, not at all. There was there was so much about Christmas that it's like, well, okay, let's look at the symbol. What can this symbol mean to Christians? Cool. Let's bank on that. They did try with Easter. Well, let's take a look.

[00:04:06] Katie Dooley: All right, so pagan things that are associated with Easter. Easter starts with Eostre, the Germanic goddess of the dawn or the Anglo-Saxon goddess of fertility and spring. This is all happening in the same part of the world, with different names and stuff.

[00:04:24] Preston Meyer: I mean to say the Anglo-Saxons are fully separate from the Germanic peoples is not quite right.

[00:04:30] Katie Dooley: No, it's not but I did see both.

[00:04:33] Preston Meyer: Yeah, as they evolved separately, their theology changed, their cultural meanings changed but...

[00:04:40] Katie Dooley: It's like Roman, Roman and Greek gods.

[00:04:43] Preston Meyer: Pretty much.

[00:04:44] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Records of Eostre are spotty at best to the point where people thought she was made up by Saint Bede.

[00:04:54] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Good old Bede.

[00:04:56] Katie Dooley: Uh, Bede Beedee, Bidet

[00:04:56] Preston Meyer: He wrote a lot. Saint Bidet that's gonna stick. He was an English fella. So, the way we say it in English is pretty authoritative, but bidet is now my favorite way to say that name.

[00:04:56] Katie Dooley: For our listeners, it's spelled B-E-D-E. Yeah. So, I guess Bede is appropriate.

[00:05:22] Preston Meyer: Bede is the way.

[00:05:24] Katie Dooley: Saint Bidet. So, most people thought she was made up by Saint Bede, BD, BD.

[00:05:32] Preston Meyer: It's kind of a weird accusation that a Christian would just make up foreign gods. But yeah, you're right.

[00:05:43] Katie Dooley: I mean, yeah, there's even finding where people actually found out about her is it's not great. But we do have relics from that range from the fifth, first to the fifth century, in this part of the world that have inscriptions that would let us believe that she was a worshiped goddess.

[00:06:04] Preston Meyer: So, Saint Bede wasn't making it up.

[00:06:08] Katie Dooley: Other than that, we have Deutsche mythology by Jacob Grimm. Yes, of the Brothers Grimm, where Eostre is connected with the hare as her sacred animal.

[00:06:21] Preston Meyer: So, we've got a Oster bunny.

[00:06:23] Katie Dooley: Or Osterhase! It's a Osterhase

[00:06:23] Preston Meyer: Right, because it's a hare, not a bunny.

[00:06:30] Katie Dooley: It's hare, not a bunny and it lays eggs, but we'll get to that.

[00:06:36] Preston Meyer: Yes, a lot of people connect Ishtar to Easter. The name similarity makes it seem like, oh, of course! It's unfortunately not to be. A lot of people have proposed it, and a lot of people have spent a lot of time arguing against this idea.

[00:06:54] Katie Dooley: Also, a lot of time you'll see memes on this. It's not true. That's where most of this.

[00:07:00] Preston Meyer: Yeah. They've been memeing it really hard. Yeah. Mostly it comes from a poor argument by Alexander Hislop, a Protestant minister who originally made the argument because they sound the same. It is just that simple. I guess he just didn't like Easter? We'll talk later about more Christians that pretty much feel the same way.

[00:07:22] Katie Dooley: And he didn't have a good understanding of ancient Sumerian religion either.

[00:07:26] Preston Meyer: To be fair, most of us don't know.

[00:07:29] Katie Dooley: That's true. I definitely do not. Ishtar was a fertility goddess that, like, kind of gave her some...

[00:07:38] Preston Meyer: Yeah. It's not like something wildly separate. But to say that it's connected isn't entirely fair.

[00:07:44] Katie Dooley: Etymologically, it's not connected at all.

[00:07:49] Preston Meyer: Pretty much. Yeah, it starts from a different part of the world from where we get the word Easter. There could be a really distant etymological connection, just like the words, the way they're built. But culturally, we're talking about two different ideas.

[00:08:07] Katie Dooley: But the idea of eggs are actually associated with Ishtar. So, I mean, maybe we get the Easter egg tradition from her, but again, she's a fertility goddess and eggs and fertility are.

[00:08:21] Preston Meyer: Well, Christianity was born in the Fertile Crescent near Mesopotamia, where these gods were talked about. And so, the whole eggs thing, it could just be that simple of an adoption.

[00:08:35] Katie Dooley: So, this idea of eggs and Ishtar actually comes from ancient Babylonians and their fertility goddess Astarte. So again, this is, like we mentioned earlier, kind of the Greek and Roman thing where we have.

[00:08:50] Preston Meyer: Neighbors that talk.

[00:08:51] Katie Dooley: You know, we have. I was going to say Thor and Zeus, but it's not the... its...

[00:08:57] Preston Meyer: So, Thor and Zeus are you know, God's the same thing from very different cultures.

[00:09:03] Katie Dooley: The Greek and Roman would be Jupiter and Zeus. So, Astarte, Ishtar to two sides of the same coin.

[00:09:12] Preston Meyer: Pretty much.

[00:09:13] Katie Dooley: And her story was that she actually hatched from an egg that fell from heaven into the Euphrates.

[00:09:19] Preston Meyer: I mean, if you're gonna be ripping through our atmosphere, protective dome is a great way to come.

[00:09:24] Katie Dooley: Maybe she's an alien.

[00:09:27] Preston Meyer: Could be.

[00:09:27] Katie Dooley: That'd be a cool way... yeah!

[00:09:30] Preston Meyer: I mean, isn't that the whole premise of the entire Stargate series? All the foreign gods are just aliens.

[00:09:38] Katie Dooley: Oh, I don't know anything about Stargate.

[00:09:39] Preston Meyer: Yeah, they come in with great power to travel the stars, and so obviously they must be worshiped as Gods. When actually, they're just long-lived aliens. Yeah. Very often or almost always on parasites. I'm trying to remember. It's been a while since I watched Stargate. I might need to get back on that.

[00:10:01] Katie Dooley: There are a few ideas behind why eggs are such a highlight of this holiday. Not just Astarte/Ishtar. Eggs were actually prohibited during the Lenten season for your fasting, so Easter to get an egg and your Easter basket was a was a treat. Sure, there's also the idea that a long time ago, we didn't have industrial egg production where.

[00:10:27] Preston Meyer: They're pretty easy to come by.

[00:10:28] Katie Dooley: Now they're pretty easy to come by. So, eggs would be scarce up until the spring season. So, ta da! Eggs, Easter, spring.

[00:10:35] Preston Meyer: Celebrating the renewal of life.

[00:10:37] Katie Dooley: Renewal of life.

[00:10:38] Preston Meyer: You know, skipping over the obvious thing of here's new baby, new life, new spring. It's kind of cool. Easter eggs were decorated. Historically, for a long time, they've been dyed. Christians have been doing it since at least the 13th century. The egg has been used to symbolize the resurrection. In Orthodox traditions, they may paint one or all of their eggs red specifically to represent the blood of Jesus. Differing traditions thereof one red one. All the rest are white. As you know, this is the blood that's going to wash over, clean the rest and the others is the blood of Christ covers everything. Not that they're competing ideas, but they are different manifestations of that idea.

[00:11:24] Katie Dooley: Oh, and I have even more information for you on that.

[00:11:26] Preston Meyer: Tell me more.

[00:11:28] Katie Dooley: So, my mom was raised Ukrainian Orthodox.

[00:11:30] Preston Meyer: Mhm. Pysankys are real work.

[00:11:33] Katie Dooley: Pysanka is huge work, and she was very good at it and so was my Baba. So, Katie story time. Buckle up. My baba had five kids, three daughters. My mom is the youngest of all kids and the youngest of the daughters. Yes, I know, the first two daughters learned how to make pierogies, but not pysanka. And then my mom learned how to make pysanka, but not pierogies. So, all of them are only like, half decent Ukrainian wives. And Baba knew how to do it all because she was amazing.

[00:12:06] Preston Meyer: Is that why your mom couldn't get a Ukrainian husband?

[00:12:10] Katie Dooley: Probably. Probably.

[00:12:13] Preston Meyer: Or came to a market where there was more options?

[00:12:16] Katie Dooley: Probably that. Uh. So, I have all of my Baba's egg books, though, and I've done it. I've never got as good as my mom or my baba, but so there is the red egg, but there's also a whole bunch of others that, if you're a good Ukrainian woman, will be in your Easter basket, representing, I think, different parts of the passion.

[00:12:36] Preston Meyer: So, all kinds of patterns.

[00:12:37] Katie Dooley: All kinds of patterns.

[00:12:39] Preston Meyer: It's pretty intense stuff. We'll have some really cool pictures in our Discord.

[00:12:42] Katie Dooley: I'll dig up the books and put them in Discord. And then you give eggs to bless people or to receive blessings. So, for example, the year Gito died Baba mean a whole bunch of eggs and would give them to people and say would say, say a prayer for Gito this year.

[00:12:59] Preston Meyer: Nice.

[00:13:00] Katie Dooley: So, and there's a myth that as long as Easter eggs are made, that good will prevail.

[00:13:07] Preston Meyer: I like it.

[00:13:09] Katie Dooley: It's kind of cute. It's about as religious as I get.

[00:13:13] Preston Meyer: Fair enough. The Catholic Church did officially adopt the Easter egg as a real symbol of the resurrection of Jesus in 1610, the year before the King James Bible was published.

[00:13:26] Katie Dooley: Oh, eggs have been around longer than the Bible. That's what I'm hearing. I mean, I guess, yeah.

[00:13:33] Preston Meyer: Longer than the authorized Bible of the Church of England.

[00:13:38] Katie Dooley: Which came first, Preston? The chicken or the Bible?

[00:13:43] Preston Meyer: No. Easy. The chicken. Of course, these eggs are laid by bunnies. So, the chicken question isn't even important? Because there's nothing more fertile than a bunny. That's probably not true, but it's a very important symbol all around the world,

[00:14:07] Katie Dooley: I think mice might be a little more prolific. But it's definitely a rodent. And definitely small rodents can just crank them out.

[00:14:15] Preston Meyer: Rabbits and hares are not rodents.

[00:14:18] Katie Dooley: I don't know where my phone is. Uh, are rabbits rodents?

[00:14:24] Preston Meyer: Pulling up the power of Google.

[00:14:26] Katie Dooley: Huh!

[00:14:29] Preston Meyer: They are close relatives to rodents, but they are not.

[00:14:32] Katie Dooley: Rodentia is a really weird word.

[00:14:34] Preston Meyer: It's the Latin rodent.

[00:14:35] Katie Dooley: Sounds like something oral. Rodentia does not include rabbits. Rabbits differ from rodents in having an extra pair of incisors and in other skeletal features. Moles and hedgehogs are also not rodents. I just learned something new. Huh! Sorry carry on.

[00:14:55] Preston Meyer: Yeah. So, rabbits and hares are lagomorphs. Which, if you're really into biology, is a thing you know about. And if you're not, Google it. But yeah, they're not rodents, but they're nifty. They breed crazy fast. They can have babies every month. And it's not just one at a time.

[00:15:14] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Their gestational period is like 30 days.

[00:15:17] Preston Meyer: Yeah. It's crazy. So, they became associated with the festival of Eostre because of fertility. That's her thing, so it just seems natural.

[00:15:31] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Having that many babies is supernatural. Pew pew pew pew pew. Pew pew pew.

[00:15:38] Preston Meyer: And of course, there was a lady who gave birth to baby rabbits.

[00:15:42] Katie Dooley: Oh, right. I remember hearing about that!

[00:15:44] Preston Meyer: Yeah. I mean, it was all a sham.

[00:15:46] Katie Dooley: Yeah, she literally put rabbits up her vagina, Those poor things.

[00:15:49] Preston Meyer: Yeah. And then squirt them back out again in front of an audience, yeah.

[00:15:54] Katie Dooley: Poor rabbits.

[00:15:55] Preston Meyer: Right? There's a lot of hygiene issues I have with this. In addition to, all of the other things.

[00:16:03] Katie Dooley: Animal cruelty.

[00:16:04] Preston Meyer: I just... Like if you're not worried about the feelings of animals and animal cruelty, how do you get to the point where you're also just comfortable doing that? Yeah.

[00:16:18] Katie Dooley: Let's go back to the Easter Bunny.

[00:16:20] Preston Meyer: So, before we get to that, okay, I want to say that everything we've talked about so far is the Easter that we know and is entirely based on other non-Christian celebrations. It's what we call the pagan stuff, except for the Easter Bunny, which you'd think just is straight up just a continuation of this idea of bunnies and eggs. But there's more. And it's just so ridiculous. The Easter Bunny was invented like the in-house Christmas tree by German Lutherans about 400 years ago.

[00:16:56] Katie Dooley: Were they just bored about 400 years ago?

[00:16:59] Preston Meyer: They had to distinguish themselves from the Catholics, I guess. So, this is a little while after the time of Martin Luther. And they just really got onto this idea of the Easter Hare, because culture doesn't die when you change national religions. Everything that is the pagan Easter stayed with the northern Germanic people, the Anglo-Saxons. Everything it's just, was still around. So, they decided, well, we've got Sinterklaas and he comes through in the winter. And of course, we can't forget Krampus, who also, in addition to blessing the good children, beats the bad ones, so Osterhase. The Easter Hare was basically springtime Santa Claus, judging children and offering colored eggs and toys to the homes of the good children while they were sleeping.

[00:17:51] Katie Dooley: I guess. Yeah, the Easter Bunny shows up when you are asleep.

[00:17:54] Preston Meyer: Yeah, because you wake up and the eggs are there.

[00:17:55] Katie Dooley: My parents just give me a basket now. I forgot about that.

[00:17:56] Preston Meyer: That was most of my Easter's with one-half of my family.

[00:18:02] Katie Dooley: We used to have to hunt. Then I moved out. And they're like, here's a basket of candy and I say thank you.

[00:18:09] Preston Meyer: Right. I have done a few Easter egg hunts. Um, some of my siblings will remember that we found chocolate eggs months after Easter.

[00:18:20] Katie Dooley: Oh, we have to. We have I there's a picture frame in my kitchen and it was like months later and I was like, sitting at breakfast and I was like, huh?

[00:18:31] Preston Meyer: So, we used to have this, um, brass unicorn in our living room next to the fireplace.

[00:18:38] Katie Dooley: That sounds amazing.

[00:18:39] Preston Meyer: It was cool. It was. It was big. It would like, take up my whole lap. It adds an adult today. It felt bigger when I was a kid. And at some point, it stopped having a horn. But there was this little divot in the head. And my either my dad or my stepmom put a little gold-wrapped egg on his forehead, and we did not see it for a long time. We looked everywhere. All around it. Parents were laughing like it's right in front of you. Well, it took forever.

[00:19:09] Katie Dooley: I believe it.

[00:19:11] Preston Meyer: So, Easter egg hunts. Definitely a part of our history. I don't know how this was the point where I got sidetracked from.

[00:19:17] Katie Dooley: It's fine. It was a good story. I told my family Easter story. Now you can tell yours.

[00:19:21] Preston Meyer: So yeah, Easter Bunny would come drop off colored eggs while the kids were asleep. It's kind of interesting, hares were often incorporated into Christian art of the medieval period. I think it's a little bit weird, but I guess a lot of people think it's perfectly normal. Pliny the Elder, Plutarch, and a whole bunch of other of the really big thinkers, kind of the guys who pushed science to start as we know it today. They were convinced that hares were hermaphroditic, just as a species. This is the way they are. This is really not typical for any mammal.

[00:19:58] Katie Dooley: I want to say something inappropriate, but I'm not. I'm not going to.

[00:20:02] Preston Meyer: Okay, and because self-fertilization doesn't take away your virginity. The hares get to be associated with Mary and so they just are often depicted in art with Mary and baby Jesus.

[00:20:18] Katie Dooley: Did you just call Mary a hermaphrodite? I think you did.

[00:20:22] Preston Meyer: There are a lot of people who think that maybe she was. And if you're leaning really hard onto some sort of scientific explanation for a virgin birth. This does it. I guess, it's tricky, but some people are satisfied with this argument, and we're not here to poop on anybody's faith.

[00:20:49] Katie Dooley: Have you listened to some of our episodes? Because we definitely have.

[00:20:52] Preston Meyer: We poop on scam artists. It's a little bit different.

[00:20:58] Katie Dooley: And Christian nationalist.

[00:21:00] Preston Meyer: Yeah. That's not pooping on their face. That's pooping on...

[00:21:03] Katie Dooley: Them, as people.

[00:21:11] Preston Meyer: Anyway, the Easter bunny. Is a Christian innovation. Out of all of this preexisting non-Christian cultural phenomenon. But within Christianity, it's kind of weird.

[00:21:27] Katie Dooley: It is weird. Now moving on to more religious or Christian things. I guess pagan is a religion.

[00:21:34] Preston Meyer: Sure is. Well, okay, kind of. It's religious.

[00:21:39] Katie Dooley: We've talked about this before. We're not going to dive in.

[00:21:42] Preston Meyer: Pagan is not a religion, but it is a religious category.

[00:21:47] Katie Dooley: The date of Easter is controversial.

[00:21:51] Preston Meyer: I have to Google it every year.

[00:21:53] Katie Dooley: I know how it's calculated, but that doesn't mean I know when it is. But I'll get into that. So, like with Christmas, Christianity grew in popularity and Emperor Constantine eventually converted to Christianity. And they knew they wouldn't be able to stop these pagan celebrations outright, so they just kind of absorbed them and created Easter.

[00:22:17] Preston Meyer: Kind of I mean, a lot of this is kind of.

[00:22:23] Katie Dooley: Easter's date is not only confusing, like Preston said, but controversial.

[00:22:29] Preston Meyer: Yeah, it took a lot of arguing. And I mean, we still have disagreements today on when and how we should calculate the date of Easter. It's kind of interesting.

[00:22:41] Katie Dooley: The first debate was whether Easter should always be on a Sunday or on the 14th of Nisan. Am I saying that right?

[00:22:49] Preston Meyer: That's a fair enough pronunciation in English.

[00:22:50] Katie Dooley: So, this is the first day in the Jewish lunar calendar where the Paschal lamb is slaughtered for Passover.

[00:22:59] Preston Meyer: Yeah, there's a lot of people anciently, modernly, who really don't like the idea of Passover being the same day that we celebrate Easter. I don't know why that is.

[00:23:12] Katie Dooley: I don't know enough about Passover. That will have to be this time next year.

[00:23:16] Preston Meyer: We'll talk about it a little bit more. Okay. But there's a lot of people who think that's actually a really nice idea, very convenient and easy to track on a calendar that doesn't have the same fluctuations that we're currently experiencing with calculating Easter.

[00:23:33] Katie Dooley: So, Easter Sunday is the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox. This was determined at the Council of Nicaea. And Easter can therefore then range between March 22nd and April 25th in any given year.

[00:23:53] Preston Meyer: I don't see the problem. If you observe the equinox and look up to notice the full moon. Easy.

[00:24:01] Preston Meyer: It's just like such a month. It's the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox. It's a lot like a lot of boxes you got to check before...

[00:24:11] Preston Meyer: The beauty of the message of the soldiers of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints!

[00:24:18] Katie Dooley: Wow. This is the first time you've sang Broadway on our podcast and I'm quite pleased. So, the controversies, the dispute was how the first full moon after the spring equinox was determined. So, people agreed.

[00:24:41] Preston Meyer: Do you just not look up and see?

[00:24:43] Katie Dooley: I don't know, um, but there's some days where it's like gray area.

[00:24:47] Preston Meyer: Sure.

[00:24:49] Katie Dooley: Anyway.

[00:24:49] Preston Meyer: But if you're looking at like the first Sunday.

[00:24:51] Katie Dooley: I guess, yeah.

[00:24:52] Preston Meyer: Is it close enough or are we going to put it off a week? It's close enough.

[00:24:56] Katie Dooley: So, I, I just I guess people way back then had trouble calculating it, but it was more or less solved by eighth century. Yeah.

[00:25:02] Preston Meyer: We've been doing it for a while.

[00:25:04] Preston Meyer: Yeah, so people just like didn't like how it was calculated. But the Council of Nicaea was in the three hundreds, I believe.

[00:25:10] Preston Meyer: Yeah, 325.

[00:25:11] Katie Dooley: Yeah. So, we agreed since then that it was the first Sunday after the first full moon, after the spring equinox, but it was just how it was calculated. People didn't like how it was being calculated with the date to add extra layers of confusion. The Julian um, calendar, which is held by Eastern Orthodox churches, have it later, just like Christmas.

[00:25:31] Preston Meyer: Yeah, but so to make it more confusing. Julian, Christmas is two weeks after Gregorian Christmas. But Julian Easter is almost always one week after Gregorian Easter.

[00:25:47] Katie Dooley: Yeah, it's always later. And you're right, it's about a week.

[00:25:50] Preston Meyer: Yeah, and that's because they still follow the same scheme, but their calendar makes it funky.

[00:25:57] Katie Dooley: Because the spring equinox and the moon doesn't change.

[00:26:00] Preston Meyer: You see, you'd think so. But liturgically speaking, there is an official liturgical equinox day that is not necessarily matched with the astronomical equinox. Yeah, it's frustrating.

[00:26:13] Katie Dooley: And confusing. And controversial.

[00:26:16] Preston Meyer: Sure.

[00:26:17] Katie Dooley: How many times can I say controversial in this episode?

[00:26:22] Preston Meyer: Uh, we've talked about this a couple of times. We probably do need to have an episode about calendars. I think people listen.

[00:26:28] Katie Dooley: Maybe it's a bonus episode because it's not actually religious, but we talk about it a lot.

[00:26:33] Preston Meyer: That's fair.

[00:26:34] Katie Dooley: If you're listening, drop a line in our discord or on our social media if you want an episode on calendars, if you want a bonus episode on calendars. Let us know.

[00:26:43] Preston Meyer: We'll get it figured out.

[00:26:47] Katie Dooley: So, what does Easter look like as a Christian holiday if not bunnies and eggs?

[00:26:51] Preston Meyer: Well, that depends a lot on the various denominations. Most non-imperial Protestant traditions really minimize what Easter is. Just have the Good Friday/Easter Sunday thing. Recognize the death, recognize the resurrection, celebrate that he suffered for sins and that's what Easter is. That is the heart of Easter. And then it gets complicated because we find ways to celebrate things in fancy, fancy ways.

[00:27:21] Katie Dooley: Yes. So, the Eastertide season can, if you wanted to be celebrated for up to three months.

[00:27:28] Preston Meyer: Yeah. The liturgical churches, the imperial tradition churches, they've got a whole big thing. The first thing that I am able to find on regular religious parareligious calendars is Fat Thursday a full week almost before Ash Wednesday, which I'll get into a little bit later.

[00:27:52] Katie Dooley: We're going to go chronologically.

[00:27:54] Preston Meyer: Yeah. It's observed in Poland, Germany, Greece, Italy, Spain and places where people who have left those countries have emigrated to. In Syria, they call it Drunkard's Thursday. Basically, it's a great time to really dig in and celebrate that. You can eat before this month-long, fast.

[00:28:17] Katie Dooley: And it's fattening yourself up for a hibernation.

[00:28:20] Preston Meyer: Yeah, it's basically the same thing with, uh, Lundi Gras and Mardi Gras.

[00:28:25] Katie Dooley: Which literally translates to Fat Monday and Fat Tuesday.

[00:28:28] Preston Meyer: Exactly. Um, some places you'll hear it called Shrove Monday and Shrove Tuesday and basically, yeah, continuation the very last days before you have to swear off all the things you love for lent.

[00:28:42] Katie Dooley: And I mean, I think most people are familiar with the New Orleans celebration of Mardi Gras as the biggest, most recognizable in the world. But yeah, you're supposed to just be bad and then you're supposed to be really good.

[00:28:54] Preston Meyer: Yeah, in England, they actually have a couple of very precise traditions. There's Collopy Monday. It's a day for bacon because you don't get bacon during lent.

[00:29:07] Katie Dooley: I feel like you would like Collopy Monday.

[00:29:10] Preston Meyer: I have had a Collopy Monday.

[00:29:12] Katie Dooley: I know you have. I know you have.

[00:29:17] Preston Meyer: Uh, that was not a great choice. But eh?

[00:29:23] Katie Dooley: Would you do it again?

[00:29:24] Preston Meyer: Long term? Would I do it again? Probably not. It may. Well, okay. I can't say it's contributed to specific health issues, but it might in the future.

[00:29:35] Katie Dooley: So, I'll remind me you were, like, gifted a bunch of bacon and needed to be cooked and eaten immediately.

[00:29:41] Preston Meyer: Oh, almost. Yeah. I waited till what was basically the end of the window before really committing to a thing, and it came time where I just didn't have anybody to come help me eat that bacon.

[00:29:54] Katie Dooley: I'm proud of. You.

[00:29:55] Preston Meyer: It was great. I, I believe it. And in East Cornwall this is like really localized. Uh, they do Peasen Monday where it's just pea soup.

[00:30:08] Katie Dooley: I could give up pea soup for lent, no problem. It's good, but it's not great.

[00:30:15] Preston Meyer: Uh, my first stepdad. Liked pea soup, and the whole house just smelled terrible when he made it. Oh, that's in the past. I will never be nearby when somebody makes pea soup again. If I can help it. I don't know why anybody would make pea soup today.

[00:30:39] Katie Dooley: Pea soup is not bad, but it's not like, again, I wouldn't gorge myself and then be upset I didn't have it for 40 days. My mom makes a really good bacon pea soup. Okay, bacon pea soup.

[00:30:50] Preston Meyer: I mean, this. I could give it another shot. It's been a while. It does have negative memories attached, but maybe I can get over that.

[00:30:59] Katie Dooley: Okay. I'm just saying it's a thing people eat, and that's fine, but not so much that you need a whole day.

[00:31:05] Preston Meyer: Yeah. I'm willing to recognize that. Sometimes you need to try a thing a second time from a second cook and sometimes admit that, yeah, you were right. It was bad the first time, but it's the chef's fault.

[00:31:24] Katie Dooley: Following Mardi Gras or Fat Tuesday is Ash Wednesday. This is the first day of Lent, and you'll often see folks with marks of crosses on their foreheads done in ashes. These ashes are collected from palm leaves burned from Palm Sunday the previous year. I also I couldn't find any record of this, but I remember I didn't grow up religious, but I grew up Irish dancing, and there's a lot of Catholics in Irish dance. And so, I remember going to dance class on Ash Wednesday and everyone would have crosses on their forehead and then they sweat them off. But I remember one of the dancers and again, this is like decades ago, telling me that when you're not supposed to like, wipe it off when it comes off, then you have been forgiven of your sins.

[00:32:14] Preston Meyer: That feels weird,

[00:32:16] Katie Dooley: But I didn't see any record of it. But I distinctly remember that conversation because I went looking for it, so I don't know.

[00:32:23] Preston Meyer: It feels like a thing that people would say, I don't know. It's also not a thing I've heard before.

[00:32:29] Katie Dooley: If you're Catholic and listening, let me know.

[00:32:32] Preston Meyer: Every year, without fail, I am always a little surprised to see somebody with a smudge on their forehead. I always lose track of the fact that it's Ash Wednesday that day, and then you see people with a mess on their forehead and I was going to a Catholic university a couple years ago. Right. So, I was surrounded by people with this ash cross on their forehead. And there was even one year where I had completely forgotten that Ash Wednesday was a thing at all. And like, what's going on? And then slowly, I'm like, oh, yeah, this is a thing. Because, you know, didn't grow up doing the Catholic thing. I went to Catholic school for a couple of years as a kid, but the Ash cross isn't usually done to elementary school kids.

[00:33:21] Katie Dooley: I was going to say I didn't know about it until, well, then I went to secular school. I went to public school. Uh, yeah. I didn't know about it until I was dancing with kids who went to Catholic school at all. I mean, I still, I mean, I guess I work from home, but I still don't see it that often out in public, except for, like I said, the handful of times dance class would fall on a Wednesday.

[00:33:42] Preston Meyer: Well, there's a very good chance you're going to see it more in public in coming years. There's this growing movement of taking the priests out of their parishes. I don't know why that was a hard thing to remember and the priests leave and don't only do this ash forehead thing in church, they do it in town squares, transit stations. They're doing it all over the place. They're calling it Ashes to Go.

[00:34:14] Katie Dooley: I saw something about that.

[00:34:16] Preston Meyer: Yeah. And it's getting more and more popular because everyone's so rushed to get everything done that it sure would be handy if I could get my ash cross while you wait for the train. It's convenient.

[00:34:29] Katie Dooley: I guess so. Then of course, Ash Wednesday starts Lent. Imperial tradition Christians observe Lent as a time to try really hard to be good Christians to make up for the rest of the year, like kids in Santa Claus.

[00:34:44] Preston Meyer: Yeah, it does feel that way because you got to get those eggs on Easter.

[00:34:50] Katie Dooley: Got to get those eggs. It's a 40 day fast, and it is modeled after Jesus's 40-day fast in synoptic gospels.

[00:34:58] Preston Meyer: I thought it was really interesting. I've been wondering for a while, though. Never enough to look it up until recently for you, dear audience, I needed to know finally had the time dedicated to it, the word lent is just the Dutch word for the spring season.

[00:35:15] Katie Dooley: Oh, that's anticlimactic.

[00:35:17] Preston Meyer: Right? So, it was the same meaning in Old English. It's just almost completely fallen out of our language, apart from the people who celebrated as a religious thing. So that's kind of nifty in other languages. Most people call it the fasting season or the 40th. For those 40 days, 40th feels weird, but that's what I was told is it's not just the 40, but the 40th. Yeah, I'm sure there's probably a language out there where they just say the 40, but most seem to be the 40th. And nobody can really say without controversy when the Lent tradition as we know it today began. But it was definitely firmly in place by the time of the Council of Nicaea in 325 CE.

[00:36:02] Katie Dooley: All right. That brings us to Palm Sunday. This is Jesus has seven days left, guys. No, five days left.

[00:36:10] Preston Meyer: Math is hard. Five is the magic number.

[00:36:13] Katie Dooley: Five is magical. He's got five days left. Clock is ticking. Commemorates his arrival in Jerusalem. And it's called Palm Sunday because his followers laid palm leaves on the ground to welcome him into the city.

[00:36:24] Preston Meyer: Yeah.

[00:36:25] Katie Dooley: And these are the palm leaves that then get burnt. Yeah.

[00:36:27] Preston Meyer: You save them for a while.

[00:36:29] Katie Dooley: For, like, a whole year to dry out.

[00:36:30] Preston Meyer: Exactly. Yeah. Because you don't want to burn something that's not ready to burn to ashes. Way too smoky. There are a few other minor days in between. So, the next big part of this week is Holy Thursday or Maundy Thursday. The celebration of Jesus Last Supper. There have been a lot of papers that I've read that argue, like, was it really a Thursday? Does the math add up?

[00:36:59] Katie Dooley: Well, I read something that said that he was almost definitely crucified on a Wednesday. I don't again, I don't know how you'd figure that out with any definitive answer, but much like his birth. Sorry, I interrupted.

[00:37:14] Preston Meyer: Yeah. So, this the day of the Last Supper. Then he goes to trial that night and the following morning, and then he gets crucified on Good Friday. Skipped over what Maundy actually means. It refers to the ceremonial washing of feet of a poor person in commemoration of Jesus washing his apostles' feet, which a lot of churches are happy to reenact. Usually, you'll see the Pope go and wash somebody's feet that day. Just an interesting tradition and the word Maundy comes from the Latin word for command, because he commanded people to go and serve and.

[00:37:51] Katie Dooley: And look after those different and less fortunate than you.

[00:37:55] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Which is a pretty great tradition.

[00:37:59] Katie Dooley: That lots of Christians choose not to do.

[00:38:02] Preston Meyer: Yeah. That's not the subject of today's discussion, but it is a thing that is real. Good Friday is a pretty good day.

[00:38:12] Katie Dooley: What? Well, I was I had to Google this. I always wondered, and much like Preston wondering about lent and never knowing, I was wondering why it was called Good Friday. What makes it so good?

[00:38:26] Preston Meyer: Well, there's a few things. It's good that Jesus suffered for us rather than suffering generally, that he did this great act for us. And so, this idea of piety is really important rather than, oh, yeah, good thing he died.

[00:38:46] Katie Dooley: Yes. And this good means pious as opposed to. Or the other word I saw was holy good as in holy or good as in pious as opposed to like, glad he's gone!

[00:38:58] Preston Meyer: We could just flip a couple of Friday's names. Maybe this could be Black Friday, the day the sky went dark when he died versus the Good Friday when everything's on sale after Thanksgiving.

[00:39:08] Katie Dooley: Yeah, I like it. I don't know who you got to pitch that to, but.

[00:39:12] Preston Meyer: Oh, I got to sell it to the whole world all at once. Everybody's got to be in on it, or it won't work.

[00:39:18] Katie Dooley: Okay. Share on Facebook.

[00:39:19] Preston Meyer: Like communism, it doesn't work if not, everybody's committed to the idea.

[00:39:24] Katie Dooley: Okay, I like rant, went on a mini rant and then Preston didn't explain it to me, so then it is followed by Easter Sunday. Easter Sunday is the day he is resurrected. This is what we celebrate, but other records say he was resurrected three days later. So, let's say he died on a Friday afternoon.

[00:39:49] Preston Meyer: See, so the error you've already made is the assumption that the important basis for this timeline is the date of death. So, everything should be calculated from what we know is the day he was raised from the dead because the Bible does explicitly tell us on the first day of the week, they showed up to an empty tomb, which is Sunday.

[00:40:11] Katie Dooley: Correct? So? So, then he wasn't.

[00:40:13] Preston Meyer: Friday could be the problem. It could have been a Thursday.

[00:40:16] Katie Dooley: Maybe that's why I saw that he had to be crucified on Wednesday. It still doesn't math right.

[00:40:23] Preston Meyer: So, the people who argue for a Wednesday crucifixion are looking for three complete, clear days in between the crucifixion and raising from the dead.

[00:40:34] Katie Dooley: And I have no problem with them saying Sunday, but then ditch the three days.

[00:40:38] Preston Meyer: Sure.

[00:40:39] Katie Dooley: Because now we have Easter Monday, which I'm pretty sure is just a bank holiday.

[00:40:43] Preston Meyer: It is. Easter Monday is only a bank holiday, and we've talked about this before. The religion of our banking system. Very powerful, but not actually important to the faith community of Christianity.

[00:40:58] Katie Dooley: So, my question goes unanswered.

[00:41:02] Preston Meyer: Repose your question.

[00:41:04] Katie Dooley: When did he die and when was he resurrected?

[00:41:07] Preston Meyer: Okay, so he definitely was resurrected either right at the beginning of Sunday morning or at the end of that night before Sunday morning, somewhere in that.

[00:41:18] Katie Dooley: So that they could find an empty tomb on a Sunday.

[00:41:21] Preston Meyer: Yeah. So, there's a lot of arguing among every kind of scholar in this field on what day would have been the correct date of crucifixion.

[00:41:36] Katie Dooley: And is it, you know, numbers in the Bible. That's probably an entire episode for us. But are they just saying three because three is so symbolic in the Bible, even though it makes all of these dates very screwed up?

[00:41:50] Preston Meyer: That's an interesting question. Generally, it was expected in Judaism at the time that if somebody were to hit their head and go into a minor coma. A couple of days, they could get back up and you'd think maybe they're dead, but you give them a few days to know for sure. After three days. I mean, you need water in that time, or you'll die. So, it was basically the three days is enough to know that somebody is dead. And if they get up after that,

[00:42:23] Both Speakers: It's a miracle.

[00:42:25] Katie Dooley: Okay, so, uh, what I'm hearing is that the three is mostly symbolic.

[00:42:30] Preston Meyer: No, it's for what they had of science at the time. It was pretty scientific,

[00:42:36] Katie Dooley: But I mean... Or one of these is a lie, though, is what I'm saying, right? Either he wasn't crucified on a Friday, or he wasn't resurrected after three days, or he wasn't raised on a Sunday because the math doesn't work. I just want to know which ones the lie, Preston.

[00:42:51] Preston Meyer: That's a really tricky thing. We're very sure. The Bible says he was found at the empty tomb on Sunday.

[00:43:02] Katie Dooley: Okay.

[00:43:02] Preston Meyer: The rest is fuzzy. And like there's even arguments about how to interpret the way they describe what would typically look like a Friday. Paraskevi is the word for preparation, which is the name for Friday in Old Greek. He was crucified on Paraskevi, but from the Jewish perspective, this could be the traditional day of preparation for the Sabbath. Or it could have been the preparation for a special Sabbath, because Passover does that. It's tricky business.

[00:43:39] Katie Dooley: Okay, as long as I'm not misunderstanding anything, we just don't know.

[00:43:46] Preston Meyer: Yeah. I mean, a lot of people are going to be. Of course, this is the sure thing, but there is so much scholarship that says it's too complicated to know with real certainty. It's very frustrating.

[00:43:59] Katie Dooley: As long as my math is right that Monday is three days after Friday.

[00:44:04] Preston Meyer: Yeah, okay. The math adds up. Monday is three days after Friday.

[00:44:08] Katie Dooley: Not crazy. Not being gaslit.

[00:44:11] Preston Meyer: Right. But like there's the question, does it need to be three clear full days in between plus the half day on either side or is it the whole 72 hours is enough kind of funny business. It's all up to interpretation.

[00:44:30] Katie Dooley: So again, we said Easter Monday is just the main colony.

[00:44:33] Preston Meyer: Yeah, but it's nice to have that holiday.

[00:44:35] Katie Dooley: It's nice to have the holiday. And then the last celebration is Pentecost Sunday, also known as Whit Sunday. And this takes place 50 days after the resurrection of Jesus.

[00:44:45] Preston Meyer: Yeah, so like Passover, Pentecost is not an originally Christian idea. I mean, very little of Christianity is original to Christianity, but so Passover celebrates the idea that God delivered Israel and by connection and extension, all of his covenant peoples in the eyes of the Christian interpretation of Scripture. And so, this idea is not just saving the covenant people from slavery in Egypt, but slavery to the devil and sin and negativity in general around the world through all time. And so, Christianity is really happy with this idea. It works really nicely. It suits it. And then Pentecost is seven weeks later and another Jewish holiday. It's about the giving of the law in the desert and a little bit of we're still in the desert.

[00:45:50] Katie Dooley: That's Shavout.

[00:45:51] Preston Meyer: It is Shavout. Well done.

[00:45:53] Katie Dooley: Thank you.

[00:45:53] Preston Meyer: Because you're not even reading it?

[00:45:55] Katie Dooley: No, I just know things now, Preston.

[00:45:57] Preston Meyer: The Christian use of Pentecost celebrates the day that Jesus ascended into the heavens, leaving the apostles to lead the church on their own. And there's an important part of the story that an awful lot of Christians forget, and we'll use, well, the absence of this passage in their personal theology to say why this fella named Jesus is actually Jesus reborn and is the Messiah. So, the passage in the book of Acts has Jesus going up into the heavens, like just ascending.

[00:46:35] Katie Dooley: Pew! That's the visual in my brain.

[00:46:38] Preston Meyer: But not that fast. It's a spectacle to see him elevated into heaven. But without the hum of an elevator. And then a couple of angels are talking to the people nearby. Like, see that? That's how he's going to come back. It's in the Bible. If you believe the Bible is authoritative, you don't get to believe that a baby is Jesus come back.

[00:47:03] Katie Dooley: Okay.

[00:47:04] Preston Meyer: But it happens all the time. And then as after he's ascended, then there's a great outpouring of gifts of the spirit that the Holy Ghost has been bestowed upon the church. And they're speaking in tongues, not like weird gibberish like you'll see in a lot of modern evangelical traditions.

[00:47:27] Katie Dooley: This is where we get the term Pentecostal Christians, because the gifts of the Holy Spirit are on these Christians and no one else.

[00:47:34] Preston Meyer: Yeah. So, if you read the story, which you'll get to in our Bible study soon, these people are like speaking in Greek and every other language under the sun to all of the people who happen to be visiting the city at the time. And so, everyone's like, this dude's speaking my language, wouldn't have expected that. That's almost exactly what it says in the book.

[00:47:58] Katie Dooley: Like in Quantummania?

[00:48:00] Preston Meyer: Yeah, and so it's weird how this really important passage for Christian theology gets ignored by an awful lot of Christians.

[00:48:14] Katie Dooley: I want to say something mean.

[00:48:17] Preston Meyer: Some people are bad at the things that they think are important.

[00:48:22] Katie Dooley: I was just.... So, speaking in tongues is made up is what I want to say.

[00:48:28] Preston Meyer: I mean, Shamala Hamala oh yeah.

[00:48:31] Katie Dooley: As we see it today.

[00:48:33] Preston Meyer: That's Eastertide. It's a few months, really.

[00:48:37] Katie Dooley: 90 days if you go from the beginning of Lent to...

[00:48:40] Preston Meyer: Yeah, 40 days before, 50 days after. It's convenient round numbers. We like that.

[00:48:46] Katie Dooley: I love a good number in religious studies. Um, can I get 90 days off of work?

[00:48:52] Preston Meyer: That'll be tricky. Okay. Most of these 90 days are not their own holiday. But you can try. You are your own boss.

[00:49:01] Katie Dooley: I am, but can anyone get 90 days off?

[00:49:05] Preston Meyer: Oh, it's tricky. I would say try it. And if you can do the three months without work, the other nine months might be more work.

[00:49:16] Katie Dooley: Don't lose your job because of us.

[00:49:19] Preston Meyer: Yeah, there are Christian groups that don't celebrate very much of what we've described as at all. Famously, I would say the Jehovah's Witnesses are pretty prominent in this list of groups that don't do that. They do a special Saturday mass that they call Passover. It's the one day where they pass around the emblems of Christ's atonement, the bread and the wine. And I mean, that's basically the deal. Most Evangelicals, Restorationists, Adventists don't really do the whole liturgical deal. It's just here's our Easter Sunday thing or Saturday and some of the Adventist groups like the Seventh Day Adventists, I guess specifically. A lot of these churches that refuse to do an Easter and they'll call it Passover, to avoid any confusion, is because they do see Easter as a strictly pagan holiday. And I mean, to be fair, after everything that we've talked about today, it feels like they're not wrong.

[00:50:29] Katie Dooley: I mean again, like you mentioned at the top of the episode, it is a very distinct split between secular and religious for Easter. And I'm sure people some people do it both, but Christmas is a much nicer blend of things.

[00:50:49] Preston Meyer: Yeah, I well, I think it's funny that our secular Easter really leans hard on the pagan Easter. And yet the only real difference is that we don't send kids out with the hope that they're thinking of being genetically prolific.

[00:51:10] Katie Dooley: Now, I don't know. Okay. I mean, I guess you were kind of raised non-religious, too.

[00:51:17] Preston Meyer: For a long time, yeah.

[00:51:19] Katie Dooley: And so, I think of, like, I'm thinking of Charlie Brown.

[00:51:22] Preston Meyer: Okay. I don't remember the Charlie Brown Easter.

[00:51:25] Katie Dooley: So, there's Charlie Brown Christmas and at the very end, Linus quotes passages from the Bible. But it's all about making this tree nice and stuff. But it is like a. I'm pretty good blend of secular and religious.

[00:51:41] Preston Meyer: Yeah.

[00:51:41] Katie Dooley: And we can even see that in something. An old secular novel like Charles Dickens, uh, Christmas Carol is mostly a secular story, but there's little bits of Christian stuff in there.

[00:51:54] Preston Meyer: Just a little bit though.

[00:51:55] Katie Dooley: Yeah, and so we have that. And then it's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown. Is the Easter one. And it's I mean, Snoopy's the Easter Beagle. They're waiting for the Easter Beagle to show up.

[00:52:06] Preston Meyer: That's fantastic.

[00:52:07] Katie Dooley: And there's zero religion in it.

[00:52:10] Preston Meyer: Okay.

[00:52:11] Katie Dooley: And is it? I remember when I first learned about the crucifixion of Jesus. I was 11 and it traumatized the fuck out of me.

[00:52:21] Preston Meyer: I mean, that's pretty gruesome part of history.

[00:52:23] Katie Dooley: And I think and so I wonder if that's part of the reason it's so separated, because the religious Easter, like we said with our friend Jack, is not a happy story. Whereas the birth of a little baby is.

[00:52:39] Preston Meyer: It's a happy story.

[00:52:41] Katie Dooley: Right? And so, I wonder if that's not part of the reason that we have such a like, how do you blend a crucifixion in a little bunny?

[00:52:50] Preston Meyer: Well, you don't. It doesn't make you it doesn't even make sense to try.

[00:52:54] Katie Dooley: That's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying is that that's why we have this hard line. Because it almost can't be. It can't be. I'm doing a thing with my hands.

[00:53:04] Preston Meyer: They can't be meshed.

[00:53:05] Katie Dooley: They can't be meshed.

[00:53:05] Preston Meyer: Yeah, yeah, I don't know. It's I think it's really interesting that over hundreds of years of the imperial tradition church trying so hard to crush so many ideas, the Easter Bunny made it through. Well, okay, the Easter Bunny came after.

[00:53:25] Katie Dooley: Relatively new.

[00:53:25] Preston Meyer: The Easter Bunny as the Easter Bunny is a Lutheran invention which feels so weird.

[00:53:32] Katie Dooley: They were weird people. I'm kidding.

[00:53:33] Preston Meyer: But the Osterhase the Easter season's special Bunny

[00:53:41] Katie Dooley: Hare.

[00:53:41] Preston Meyer: Hare is such an old idea that we've just always had, and we could never get rid of it. And then eventually some new group came and made it full on official.

[00:53:53] Katie Dooley: Yeah. It is an interesting holiday. Well, I hope you all got lots of chocolate.

[00:54:00] Preston Meyer: Right. Maybe a little bit of some good healthy egg protein.

[00:54:05] Katie Dooley: Um.

[00:54:09] Preston Meyer: I think it's really interesting. I remember a lady that I used to visit occasionally when I lived in New Jersey. It was the tradition to have cold ham on Easter. Now, this was strictly forbidden in the Passover tradition. And all of the people who celebrated Passover anciently, because ham is not known to eat. But it was kind of this idea that you don't cook during Easter, so you'd get a cured ham and dice it up and mix it into a salad or something, or...

[00:54:40] Katie Dooley: I should have talked to my mom before this, but yeah, like they like her mom was an immigrant to Canada from Ukraine and they like very much observed Ukrainian Easter and Ukrainian Christmas. And yeah, they used it. I won't say weird traditions, but they were strict about, like, what you were allowed to eat. And remember, fish was a big thing. m. Yeah, they were very strict. And like I said, their Easter baskets, they were really strict on what you had to give the priest. Um, my mom knows Ukrainian enough to pray in Ukrainian and to thank a priest for an egg. And that's kind of all she knows. But enough that it was that traditional but...

[00:55:27] Preston Meyer: Right and I think...

[00:55:29] Katie Dooley: There's a lot of ritual around Easter.

[00:55:31] Preston Meyer: Sure. So, after I got back home and spent holidays with my family again, I noticed that we pretty often have ham for Easter, and I think that's a pretty common tradition that it's not a bird or a beef roast. It's a ham, very, very often.

[00:55:48] Katie Dooley: I'm going to talk to him. We have turkey at Easter. Yeah, okay.

[00:55:52] Preston Meyer: I mean, I'm not saying everybody does because my family does. That's a perfectly good reason.

[00:55:58] Katie Dooley: We don't Like ham.

[00:56:00] Preston Meyer: But it reminds me that there was a vision that Peter had. That makes sense. Connecting the ham to Easter a little bit, that Peter had this vision that Jesus came to him with a sheet full of all these animals that weren't supposed to be eaten pig, lobster, whatever. And Peter's like, no, no, no, don't eat that. That's gross. That's dirty. And Jesus said, no, no, I cleaned it. It's good to go. And three times Peter's like, no, no, no, not for me.

[00:56:33] Katie Dooley: Peter's really good at denying things three times!

[00:56:38] Preston Meyer: You could say that. And eventually, he's like, okay, I'll eat. And then ham is officially fine for Christians to eat.

[00:56:50] Katie Dooley: I think pork gives me nightmares.

[00:56:54] Preston Meyer: Oh, yeah. Tell me more.

[00:56:56] Katie Dooley: I've had some incredibly violent dreams. And then when I wake up, every time I've had pork the night before for dinner. And the first time, the first two times, I thought it was because you can't. You can eat all Alberta pork not well done

[00:57:16] Preston Meyer: Right? Cause we're super clean.

[00:57:17] Katie Dooley: Yeah. So, the first two times they were not well-done pork. And I thought it was just because it wasn't well-done pork. I don't I don't know how your brain works with the food you digest, but I literally had pork this week, and I had a very violent dream. And Bryant, my husband, our sound guy, is like, maybe it's because you think every time you eat pork, you're gonna have a nightmare. And I was like, no, I didn't even think about it until I woke up from the nightmare, huh? And was like, oh, I had pork for dinner.

[00:57:50] Preston Meyer: Well, now I'm curious if anybody else has had this experience.

[00:57:54] Katie Dooley: It might not be pork, but I'm pretty sure your food can give you nightmares.

[00:57:57] Preston Meyer: I know that there is this weird connection between your brain and your stomach. I do know that much. Do I know anything enough about it to explain it. No. I'm a religion dude, not a biology dude.

[00:58:09] Katie Dooley: And so, I don't mind a good pork chop or a pork tenderloin, but now I don't. I don't like nightmares.

[00:58:15] Preston Meyer: I need more data.

[00:58:18] Katie Dooley: Like what? Kind of like, do you need me to eat more pork?

[00:58:21] Preston Meyer: Oh, okay. So, more data from you is good. But I want to hear from our audience. If any of you have any comparable experience with pork, I need to know.

[00:58:31] Katie Dooley: Or I just want to know any food-related nightmares.

[00:58:34] Preston Meyer: Sure. Yeah. Let's open it up. I need data.

[00:58:36] Katie Dooley: Okay.

[00:58:38] Preston Meyer: This is a thing I want to know more about.

[00:58:40] Katie Dooley: Okay. This has turned into.

[00:58:41] Preston Meyer: Could you imagine if there was? It wasn't the whole pigs are dirty because they sleep in their own...

[00:58:49] Katie Dooley: But because everyone.

[00:58:50] Preston Meyer: But because they become violent when they eat ham. Could you imagine if that was a thing back then that they noticed.

[00:58:55] Katie Dooley: Maybe we feel like you're like a demon because you're getting bad visions?

[00:59:01] Preston Meyer: Sure.

[00:59:02] Katie Dooley: Like, literally one of my dreams a lady was stoned to death, and I was like, that's fucked up.

[00:59:07] Preston Meyer: Sure, I need to know more.

[00:59:12] Katie Dooley: All right, you got very passionate about that.

[00:59:16] Preston Meyer: I'm very curious.

[00:59:18] Katie Dooley: The end of our Easter episode again. I hope none of you have pork nightmares and you all get some Easter candy, whether you observe it or not. Thank you to our patron, Lisa. Follow us on all our social media and be sure to DM us or post in our discord about some of the questions we've asked today. So, DM us on Facebook or Instagram. If you want to support the podcast monetarily, which we would love. Um, you can join our Patreon. We have a bonus episode here and we have our book club tier. And if you know, like any of that, which I don't know why you wouldn't, we also have our Spreadshop where you can buy some sweet, sweet, Holy Watermelon merch.

[00:59:59] Preston Meyer: And all the links are in our show notes. Thanks for joining us.

[01:00:04] Both Speakers: Peace be with you.