But we've never done it this way before...

Sixty-six years I've lived without knowing the tradition of the Pascha Egg!

Now, I know - and my husband will be incorporating its story

in the Kids' Talk at church on Easter Sunday morning.

 

The story goes that Mary Magdalene traveled to Rome to protest to Tiberius Caesar that Pontius Pilate had conspired with the two high priests and executed an innocent man -- our Lord Jesus.   Since people were expected to bring the Emperor a gift when they visited him, she took an egg and was handing it to him with the greeting:  "Christ is risen!"

Tiberius Caesar in disbelief responded, "How could anyone ever rise from the dead? It is as impossible as for that white egg to turn red." While Tiberius was speaking these words, the egg in the hand of Mary Magdalene began changing color until it finally became bright red.

Thus the Pascha greeting -- in universal Christendom, both East and West -- has ever since remained "Christ is risen!" and it became traditional for Christians throughout the world to color eggs in red.