“On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined” (Isa. 25:6)
Holy Week and the Triduum have a lot of worship, and from waving palms and stripping altars to lighting fires and flowering crosses, many of the liturgical practices are unique to the week. Even as vital and satisfying as our worship may be, there’s more to the way we mark the resurrection of Christ—the good news that the grave has no more ultimate authority—than our worship. There is food and feasting. And such is the sign of that great banquet to come.
Some churches have a feast—a breakfast—in the middle of the night; the Lebanese Catholic Church in our community has it around 3 a.m. after its vigil. Our Episcopal parish has it situated, with some logistical precision, between services on Easter morning. And it is most certainly not “coffee hour relocated.” Rather, it’s an opportunity to lavish joy on one another in the light of the resurrection.
Well, joy and cholesterol—bacon, sausage, egg casseroles, buttery pastries, hot-cross buns, and an explosion of fruit. Hot coffee is there, but so are mimosas amid lively conversation, children hunting Easter eggs, and the echoing words, “Alleluia! Christ is Risen.” “My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness; and my mouth shall praise you with joyful lips,” Psalm 63:5 says. Nothing captures that better than an Easter breakfast.
When I was growing up in rural Ohio, Easter breakfast was one of my favorite church celebrations. Church members shared their gifts with our community—crisp sausage from one farmer, gooey maple syrup tapped on another local farm, and pancakes flipped right in front of you by the church leaders. Despite the early-morning hour, a din of laughter and shared conversation filled the fellowship hall as people lingered over their breakfast with brothers and sisters in Christ.
But this gathering was always a stark contrast with the meal we shared on Thursday. In those days, our Church of the Brethren congregation observed a Love Feast consisting of prayerful preparation, foot-washing, a shared meal, and Communion. The shared meal was not a riot of rich food but rather torn bread and beef in a bowl covered with broth. In those days, we ate that Thursday meal in complete silence. The only sounds were the clinking of metal spoons on ceramic bowls as we were invited in candlelight to contemplate the Last Supper.
These meals—the silent and simple supper of Thursday evening and the loud, lively feast on Sunday morning—were antipodes, framing the arc of Maundy Thursday to Easter Sunday. But there’s more to be said about celebrating Easter with rich food than listing different practices from the contemporary American church scene.
The evolution of the Easter breakfast (or brunch, if you prefer) happened in concert with other developments in the early and medieval Church. In Scripture, the risen Jesus shares a breakfast on the beach—at dawn, no less—with the disciples in John 21. At the start of the third century, Tertullian, in his De Corona Militis, described newly baptized Christians receiving milk and honey after being baptized, a practice corroborated by several other north African writers. These are admittedly weak links to our Easter breakfasts.
The more important development was the integration of Lenten fasting in the church calendar. While there was a practice of fasting during the Lenten season from very early in the Christian tradition, expectations differed regionally. By the early Middle Ages there was a more universal set of expectations emerging in the Christian West, and with such fasting appeared corresponding celebrations—if one fasts, one must “break fast.”
By the ninth century, Ash Wednesday became the date to begin fasting to ensure a full 40-day fast, a duration inspired by Christ’s fasting in the wilderness. Around this time, likewise, the kinds of foods from which Christians ought to fast became clearer—eggs, dairy, animal fats, and meat. Most readers of Covenant will know that the days immediately before Lent became days to use up supplies of these sorts of foods so that they did not go to waste during the fasting season. Hence Mardi Gras and Carnival.
Easter breakfast then became a way for communities of Christians to gather and break their fast together. What better way to mark the end of Lent and celebration of Easter than with all of those lovely foods that are full of milk, butter, and eggs? In the high and later Middle Ages, Easter was a time for extravagant liturgy, to be sure, but also a time for Christians to celebrate the end of fasting, a time to share in the things that they had set aside for a season. They reveled in the gastronomic delights that would now replace salted fish (if they were lucky) and plain bread. Having an Easter feast served as a practical marker. But It was not merely the entry into a new season of the church calendar, but one that exceeded even the normal dietary bounds that were now restored after the Lenten fast.
Easter brunches are about more than simply eating the things that had been set aside during Lent. They are a time to gather as a community and recognize the great abundance that God offers, not only in this life but in the world to come. Christians have the promise of a great feast on that last and unending day, but there is more. We also have the Holy Spirit’s presence among us and within us to bring about, if only partially, signs of the kingdom here and now.
If these things are true, then a feast is not merely an “extra” of the Christian life, something we’ll do if there’s time left over from all our liturgical planning. No, a feast is a marker of the Spirit’s presence and a sign of the in-breaking kingdom. We are a people of the Wedding Feast of the Lamb, and that reality is anticipated in the life of the Church. Our delight in the good news of resurrection—and the truth that we who are sealed to Christ in the power of the Spirit will have a share in his victory over death—should flow beyond our worship, overflowing into our relationships with one another. An Easter brunch offers an opportunity to live the new life in community promised to us.
And it should be a sign of delight in one another by bringing our best—not just the best foods we can share, but a time to lavish honor on each other. This is not the time to be utilitarian. Break out the tablecloths. Set out flowers. Maybe bring some gold balloons. These things say, “I care about you!” They say, “I will bring my best for you, my sisters and my brothers.” And this is because God has shown such extravagance for us, welcoming us to his feast. When Christ had breakfast with the disciples on the beach, perhaps that was merely the first course in the vision Isaiah had, a feast for all people “of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined.”
But, you may be asking, what about gluttony or excess? Isn’t that what is actually happening here? While it may be that some overindulge when given such a delicious opportunity, the Easter brunch is not centered on feasting for the sake of feasting or solely for enjoyment, but rather serves as an outgrowth of the celebration that Christ has defeated sin, death, and the devil and that God has provided for us. Easter brunches and breakfasts, then, should be celebrated as a rightful part of our spiritual practice.
In other words, and put most simply: fellowship is important, and nowhere is this seen more clearly and theologically than at an Easter breakfast.
Holy Week and Easter Day take a lot of work. Yes, we should invest time and energy in getting our service leaflets printed, our choirs rehearsed, our palms laid out, our Gethsemane prayer watches organized, and acolytes primed for action. But, as a commitment to the resurrection and all that it means for us right now and on the great and unending day, we need to invest in Easter breakfasts. Making time to celebrate the resurrection in community reminds us that our discipleship is a shared journey and that in this Easter season, it should be one marked by fellowship, celebration, joy, and hope. And it never hurts to have a buttery pastry or another sausage.
Denise Kettering-Lane, PhD is a Guest Writer. She is Associate Professor of Brethren Studies at Bethany Theological Seminary, Richmond, Indiana. Dr. Kettering-Lane has served for more than a decade as Editor of Brethren Life & Thought and she chairs the Brethren Historical Committee which oversees the Brethren Library & Archives in Elgin, Illinois. Dr. Kettering-Lane is married to an Episcopal priest and is active at St. George's, Dayton, Ohio.
