Easter season begins day one of this month, starting with an octave that ends coincidentally with the Easter of our Orthodox friends on Divine Mercy Sunday (8). Good Shepherd Sunday (22) is World Day of Prayer for Vocations.

The reading from Acts of the Apostles is a kind of “mini-gospel”: We hear of the baptism John preached and of Jesus anointed with spirit and power, going about doing good and healing, and of his death and Resurrection. We hear ourselves included in the story: those to whom Jesus is visible, who eat and drink with him, who preach and witness to him.

Sooner or later, you and I end up visiting the cemetery. The older we get, the more personal significance such visits have for us. More names on the headstones are familiar. We begin to count off the funerals we’ve been to. We remember the good old times with people we knew and maybe some last words.

Early in the morning on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone was moved away from the entrance. She ran at once to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, breathlessly panting, “They took the Master from the tomb. We don’t know where they’ve put him.”

The blessing of Easter baskets is a tradition from Eastern Europe still celebrated in many churches on Holy Saturday, leaving behind the smell of sausage, ham, and fresh baked bread to complete with the more traditional scents of beeswax and incense.

The pastor of a rundown urban parish wanted an old-fashioned Easter parade to liven things up. So his never-say-die events coordinator made it happen.

I’ve always had a hard time with Easter. Maybe it’s that I don’t do well when I eat too much candy, which I inevitably do on Easter Sunday. But I find Easter a difficult day to celebrate. I feel a lot like the disciples who, even after Jesus’ Resurrection, scurried back to the upper room uncertain and confused.

Why should we be thinking about what has perhaps been the most popular movie ever of the season—the Christmas season, that is, It’s a Wonderful Life? Sure, its heartwarming, climactic ending occurs next to a Christmas tree and snow is falling and Jimmy Stewart is singing “Auld Lang Syne” off key. But in reality, it is a movie made more for what Easter is all about than Christmas.

We call on the name of our risen Lord, who forgives our sins.

Before the Resurrection of Jesus, the disciples had not perceived the true significance of their master’s person and work. . . . It could be said that from “disciples” Jesus’ followers became true “believers” through the Easter experience.