“Forced to lake a holiday”

Press, 10 April 1980, Page 20

“Forced to lake a holiday”

Sir, — With your permission I should like to correct a mistake in the editorial of April 7. Easter Monday has no significance whatever for the Christian world, as the Resurrection is celebrated on Easter Sunday. The holiday on Easter Monday therefore was not “imposed” by Christians. I do not know who is responsible but perhaps the Federation of Labour could enlighten you. — Yours, etc., EILEEN CAMPBELL, Rangiora. April 8, 1980. Sir, —May I add my congratulations on the Easter leader (April 7). I am distressed, however, that Mrs Dromgoole, whose father was an Anglican priest, has called incorrect the identification by “The Press” of Easter Monday as a “Holy Day.” The three major feasts of the Christian year — Easter, Christmas, and Pentecost — are three-day celebrations, as Mrs Dromgoole can read in the rubrics of the book of Common Prayer. Christmas-is followed by the feasts of St Stephen and St John, and the Mondays and Tuesdays after Easter and Pentecost are red-letter days, called “Greater Feasts.ln practice, Easter Monday is a traditional dav for weddings in those parishes which have no weddings in Lent. It is also the traditional celebration of the meeting of the

risen Christ with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus (St Luke 24:13-35). Easter Monday and Tuesday are indeed Holy Days. — Yours, etc., The Rev. RAYMOND OPPENHEIM, Vicar of Avonside. April 9, 1980. Sir, — Speaking as a committed Christian, I agree with much of today’s editorial (though I do not regard Easter Monday as a specifically “Holy Day,” or oppose use of the season for -wholesome relaxation and recreation. Christians could observe Good Friday without a holiday. But the problem remains: the public would not surrender two statutory holidays, and some sorely need the long week-end. An alternative secular long week-end could prove equally godless, or more so without the vestiges of “Holy Day” restraint. I consider such abolition largely cosmetic. Initially, the only way to treat any and every day as holy, and to deal effectively with the uglier symptons of national life, is, in my conviction, death (figuratively) on the part of the individual to the old life of “Christianity’s deadly sins,” and a new life in the risen Christ. This, surely, is what Easter and Christianity are all about. — Yours, etc., C. J. BENT, April 7, 1980. Sir, — Even as a Christian I would agree with the sentiments expressed in your editorial (April 7). In the United States there are almost no public holidays at the time of Christian feasts and this without apparent loss of fervour by the faithful. In Malaysia, a country of diverse races and religions, each worker is entitled to three festival leave days each year in addition to normal annual leave. These may be used, at short notice, for observances of the worker’s own choice. If some of the existing public holidays in New Zealand were reallocated to a similar, scheme then the difficulties experienced by, for example, Maori workers in attending a tangi would be removed, — Yours, etc., V. J. BIDWELL. April 7, 1980.