The Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC) Archbishop Amfilohije yesterday in Belgrade read the Easter message. He was acting on behalf of the ailing head of the SPC, His Holiness Patriarch Pavle.

“In these times of Easter joy and the Divine mercy for all, the Serbian Orthodox Church especially dwells on human injustice and violence of the power-wielders over Kosovo and Metohija, over Serbia, and the entire Serb nation,” the message of the SPC says.

The message will also be read in all SPC temples in the country and abroad as Orthodox Serbs gather to celebrate Easter Day next Sunday, April 27.

The patriarch and all the archbishops urged that Kosovo and Metohija should be deserved and preserved before God through work and honest living, and that this should also contribute to the salvation of the local Serb people, Amfilohije said.

“Kosovo is an integral part of the life of every Christian Orthodox Serb,” the message pointed out, and concluded that the “creators of this historic injustice have inflicted on the Serb people a pain and suffering that, in spite of everything, points the way to the unique message of the suffering and salvation on Calvary”.

Cyprus conservationists are on the warpath over the felling of protected trees used in bonfires to celebrate the sentencing of Judas Iscariot to eternal damnation as part of Easter celebrations.

Hundreds of trees face the chop for the pyre in an age-old tradition symbolising the burning of Judas, the wayward disciple Christians believe betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. Judas is represented by a stuffed dummy on the top of the pile, known in the Cypriot dialect as a “lambrajia”. Bonfires used to be held in church courtyards. But the tradition has evolved into one big all-night rave in some cases replete with barbeques and beer and, if in a residential area, an army of angry neighbours.

“It mostly involves young people, who compete with each other on who will have the bigger bonfire,” said Ioanna Panayiotou, spokeswoman for the Cyprus Greens Party. The party recently got word of eucalyptus trees being felled, and of trees disappearing in a park, she said.

Greek Cypriots, who in their majority are members of the Orthodox Church, celebrate Easter, which is the most important day in their religious calendar, on April 27.

Cyprus Airways will provide extra flights to and from Greece and Israel over the Orthodox Easter weekend.

About 50 additional flights will be laid on to cope with high demand during the holiday from April 18 until May 3. Cyprus Airways said this would help to accommodate some of the student traffic as many Cypriots who are studying abroad head home for the Easter break. Some 20 more flights will cover the Athens route, the same number to and from Thessaloniki, four more to Crete, two extra to Iraklion and there are four additions to the Tel Aviv route.

Orthodox Easter runs from April 25-28. Cyprus Airways said it would consider adding more flights during the holiday period if it became necessary.

Last week, many western Christians observed Easter, the celebration of Jesus Christ’s resurrection three days after being crucified. However, for followers of Orthodox Christianity, Easter is still less than a month away, with this year’s celebration falling on April 27.

The disparity in dates lies in the different calendars followed by each faith. The Orthodox Church and Roman Church split from each other in the Great Schism of 1054, mostly over both Churches disagreement with increasing papal authority.

The Orthodox church is not headed by a pontiff but rather an organization of self-governing churches that believe “no one but Christ himself is the real head of the Church,” according to Orthodoxy in America. The Othodox Eastern Church is headed by His All Holiness, Bartholomew, Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople.

The Eastern Orthodox Church, as well as many Eastern Catholic churches, follow the Julian calendar established by Julius Caesar.

The Western church uses the Gregorian calendar, which was established in 1582 by Pope Gregory XIII as a reformed version of the earlier calendar. The Gregorian calendar is 13 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which, coupled with differing definitions of a full moon and an equinox, account for the date disparity.

Although the date of Easter is a matter of differing faiths, Orthodox and western Christians share many Easter traditions.

One is the practice of painting Easter eggs, which originated in the 13th century out of an earlier Christian tradition in which eggs were forbidden to be eaten during Holy Week. As a symbol of their faith, Christians marked the Holy Week eggs by dying or painting them.

Eastern Orthodox Christians also observe Lent, a 40-day fasting period excluding Sundays that culminates during the week before Easter, or Holy Week.

Sources: britannica.com, The Religion Newswriters Association, Orthodoxy in America

Limassol Police yesterday announced the launch of a campaign against firecrackers, in a bid to uphold the safety of the public from this dangerous but popular Easter tradition.

“In the past, many people have been injured or mutilated because of firecrackers, so police are taking preventive measures,” said Filippos Papaelias, who was recently promoted to Deputy Limassol Police Chief.

Preventive measures include police visits to schools, local communities and municipalities to inform people, particularly the young, of the risks involved in using firecrackers. Police officers will be touring Limassol schools from today and until schools close for the Easter break to give presentations to students on this issue. The campaign also includes conducting searches at kiosks or other establishments from where people buy firecrackers or the materials to make them.

“Anyone selling such products is dealing dangerous items and harming society as a whole. If traced, these items will be confiscated,” Papaelias said.

Police confirmed they had already received numerous complaints from the public about the noise made by firecrackers, let off outside their homes. Police said they would not hesitate to prosecute anyone found in possession of firecrackers. Regular patrols will also be made outside churches to oversee preparations for ‘lambratzia’, the setting of fires at churchyards for the symbolic burning of Judas at the stake.

“The lambratzia tradition will be maintained, but with caution so that private property or electricity poles are not damaged. If police sees any dangerous lambratzia-related activity, it will be removed. Police are co-operating with church committees, which will inform police if they view any dangerous activity taking place,” Papaelias said.

The “Dream Smugglers” return, filling the old streets of the old Belgian town of Jemappes with huge dolls and cockerels. Despite snow, the Dream Smugglers bring back their world of fantasy as they do every Easter to the Walloon area of Belgium.

  The “Dream Smugglers” return, filling the old streets of the old Belgian town of Jemappes with huge dolls and cockerels.

It was the first “white” Easter in Belgium since 1982. But the spot of snow wasn’t enough to chill the 4-day Jemappes carnival which has carried on every year for more than a century. Musicians, including elementary school children and professionals took part. They were ordinary townsfolk and members of the “Smugglers” theatrical company.

The “Smugglers”, however, have only been around for three years, assaulting the town on Easter Monday with giant dolls, cockerels and puppets.

Yves Coumans, artistic drector of the parade, said > ”It’s about making beautiful things together, meeting people, making people meet people who may not normally meet in daily life or who would not talk to each other in the same way because, all of us, when we finish work, we sit down together, we talk, we drink a cup of coffee, so it’s a very strong social bond, and here, we are in a region which has suffered a lot, which is short on optimism, dynamism and energy and I think a parade like this one injects dynamism into the city.”

The giant articulated cockerel is 5-meters high. It leads the procession as the symbol of Jemappes. Ten parade floats, each with its own theme, rolled through the streets. The parade’s prize entry however is the huge ogre: 12 meters high, 8 meters wide and weighing more than 100 kilos. Children are drawn to have a look at its belly, covered by a road map of the ogre’s many long journeys. The carnival, in the good old Belgian tradition, ended with fireworks.

From the streets of Caracas to a rain-soaked Saint Peter’s Square, Christians around the world celebrated Easter Sunday amid messages of renewal, peace and hope.

At the Vatican, Pope Benedict XVI called for “solutions that will safeguard peace and the common good” in Tibet, the Middle East and Africa during his traditional Easter message. Tens of thousands of pilgrims turned out to hear the “Urbi et Orbi” (to the city and the world) message, sheltering from the pelting rain under a sea of umbrellas in the flower-bedecked Saint Peter’s Square. 

In Britain, the leader of the world’s Anglican communion, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, warned that “comforts and luxuries” would eventually run out, and that civilisation in its current form would collapse. 

As the faithful marked the resurrection of Jesus Christ after his crucifixion on Good Friday, worshippers found ways to celebrate this holiest date in the Christian calendar in even the most difficult circumstances.

In Jerusalem, Christian pilgrims from around the world flocked to celebrate Easter in Jerusalem’s Old City where many believe Jesus to have been resurrected after his crucifixion.

In Venezuela, Holy Week celebrations conclude with a political twist each year with the “Burning of Judas,” in which unpopular politicians are hung and burned in effigy. This year Colombian President Alvaro Uribe was torched in the central Caracas neighorhood of San Agustin. Colombia and Venezuela almost went to war in early March, and Uribe and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez have long had a testy relationship. 

In China, the Tibetan Catholic Church in Cizhong, a Christian enclave on the threshold of the Himalayas, saw its Easter services curbed after anti-Chinese riots in Lhasa caused the region’s deadliest tensions in two decades. As a result, the tiny community of less than 1,000 souls, snuggled amid picturesque mountains in an overwhelmingly Buddhist area, has been affected by the recent unrest where it matters the most for them: religion.

In Australia, Anglican Archbishop Phillip Aspinall, focused on the environment. In Seoul, some 20,000 Christians held a non-denominational Easter service in front of city hall, raising money for victims of an oil spill last December. Throughout Germany, thousands of pacifists took part in some 90 Easter weekend demonstrations that included a bicycle ride demanding German troops pull out of Afghanistan. In Afghanistan itself, Canadian soldiers deployed through NATO received chocolate Easter eggs, although no chaplain was available to hold a mass at their base camp.

In Russia, Catholics, a minority in the mainly Orthodox Christian country, celebrated Easter at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Moscow. The Eastern Orthodox Church, which still uses the Julian calendar rather than the Gregorian calendar, holds its Easter on April 27. Orthodox Easter in Greece and Cyprus will be celebrated on this date next April.