Collective Worship (P): Easter in Germany

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AGE: Infants and Juniors

THEME: Christian Traditions: Easter in Germany

AIM:

One of a series illustrating some of the Christian customs and traditions around the world.

INTRODUCTION:

Ask the children what they think Easter is? What do they think people do on Easter Day? What day of the week does Easter always fall on? Talk briefly about different Easter customs - including going to church! Say that Easter is celebrated all round the world in a whole variety of ways. If the children lived in Germany, for instance, here are some things they might be doing.

DEVELOPMENT:

Trumpets in the cemetery
Most German churches have their own brass band, to make a stirring noise as they play hymns and voluntaries. It is a widespread tradition that the church band goes to the local graveyard or cemetery at dawn on Easter Day and plays hymns about Jesus rising from the dead.

Often the local church will have an 'Easter Night' service in the church. It begins at 5.30 in the morning, in the dark. During the service (liturgy) the church is lit first by the large Easter candle and then gradually by more and more candles. By the end of the service, daylight is beginning to shine through the windows. The service culminates in communion and then each member of the congregation lights a taper at the Easter candle, which they take out of the church into the graveyard where the trumpeters are waiting. The worshippers then join the trumpeters in proclaiming the good news of Jesus's resurrection.

Ask how many children are expecting to have Easter eggs. Sometimes people put the eggs on the breakfast table. If the children lived in Germany, this is what they might enjoy eating.

Easter Lambs
In Germany, people bake lambs to put on the Easter breakfast table. They are made of sponge cake and have to be baked in a special form.

You might make one to be shared - or to show pupils during the time of worship. There is a picture of one to use as an OHT:

Recipe for 'Easter Lamb'

75g	butter or margarine
100g	sugar
	Vanilla (or use vanilla sugar)
2	eggs
10	drops of rum flavouring
	pinch of salt
100g	self-raising flour
25g	cornflour

Pre-heat the oven to 175-200 degrees C. Cream the fat. Gradually add the beaten eggs and seasoning, sieve the flour and cornflour together and stir it into the mixture a tablespoon at a time. Put the mixture into the well-greased baking form. Bake in the middle of the oven for 35-45 minutes. Let the lamb cool in the tin for about 5 minutes and then remove it from the form and place on a cooling rack. The lamb can either be dusted with icing sugar, or iced and sprinkled with grated coconut while the icing is still wet.

PRAYER AND REFLECTION:

Great and gentle God,

We praise you for all your works -
in giving us the ingredients which we can mix together and make Easter lambs;
in making each one of us different and yet able to become one when we live and work together.

Let the words that we say - like the music we sing - tell that Jesus lives in each one of us.

Amen.

READING:

This can be introduced by saying that Jesus is often thought of as being gentle as a lamb, but his love has the strength of a lion.

'The Prayer of Hadewich of Brabant' from The Lion Christian Quotation Collection, compiled by H Ward and J Wild, published by Lion, ISBN 0 745 93694 6.

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