Even if we feel smug, having completed Form 1040 long before now, the day quietly reminds us of the old saying that the only things certain are death and taxes. Christians have special reason to rejoice this year. The different calendars of East and West converge to allow all Christians to celebrate Easter on the same day. However, unlike death and taxes, the certainty of Resurrection is not self-evident. Like most promises, it requires something of us.
Easter requires faith.
Even casual readers of the four Gospels recognize the difficulty of such faith. Caught in the grave of our own negative expectations, cynicism has become cultural chic. No wonder we can't see the Resurrection promise. We presume that we shall have the last, cynical, negative word. God laughs at our blindness and cynicism and then simply raises Jesus from the dead.