Why do Unitarian Universalists celebrate Easter? Is it that we are rather promiscuous with our religious observances? Do we just want to appear, however briefly, normal, not so persistently iconoclastic in comparison to the Christian community? Is it the case that those of us who come from a Christian background retain an emotional attachment to the season—even if we don’t really believe the story about Jesus rising from the dead?

Of course, it is entirely possible that Jesus could have risen from the “dead.” In that era, and up until fairly recently, there were always ambiguous cases in which someone appeared to be dead yet it was very difficult to determine if the person had actually died. We have our closes cases today but they all are derived from mechanical interventions in medical practice. We have machines which can breathe for people, machines which can pump blood for people, and intravenous solutions by which we can feed people. Were it not for those interventions we could tell today with a great deal of certainty if someone had died. But back in the time of Jesus close cases were impossible to call. While much of anatomy was quite well understood, no one really knew then what the various anatomical organs did, and certainly did not understand how they did it. It wasn’t until the early 16th century that the Spaniard Michael Servetus, one of the early Unitarians in our history, described the circulatory system. But even with that advance he knew nothing abut the function of blood.

Given the state of medical knowledge previous to the modern era, if someone appeared lifeless, they were presumed to be dead. One of our 18 th century European ancestors, George deBenneville, for example, suffered a great fever as a young man and was declared dead. But he awoke in his coffin forty two hours later and lived to emigrate to the United States where he preached the gospel of universal salvation for some twenty five years. Indeed, it happened that some people put into tombs or buried were not quite thoroughly dead. The risk of being buried alive was such that an enterprising inventor Franz Vester was awarded a patent by the United States government in 1868 for a coffin that had included a hollow pipe that extended above ground at the top of which a bell was suspended. When the theoretically deceased was placed in the coffin a rope running through the pipe and attached to the bell was placed in his or her hand so that, just in case they “arose from the dead,” they could ring the bell to be rescued. The fear of being buried alive was, in fact, quite commonplace. George Washington made the following deathbed request. “Have me decently buried, but do not let my body be put into a vault in less than two days after I am dead." Frederic Chopin’s last words were, “Swear to make them cut me open so that I won’t be buried alive.”

So it might have been the case that Jesus “rose” because he only appeared to be lifeless, yet awoke in the tomb, and figuring that one can only cheat death so many times, said, in Aramaic, “I am so out of here!”

Of course, that is not exactly the resurrection story that orthodox Christians have in mind. They mean that Jesus was really, really dead, and that he really really was rescued from death by the awesome power of God alone. To a thoroughgoing skeptic that just seems too good to be true. But, particularly if we consider “resurrection” as a metaphor, there may be more to this theology than pure skepticism would allow.

Ask yourself, does death have dominion over life or does life have dominion over death? Which in reality is the more powerful force in the universe? Consider the fact, for instance, that there is something that we conventionally understand as “life” at all. From the cooling of fiery gasses that formed a planet to the first proteins joining together in ancient seas, it almost seems as if there is something inexorable about this entire process. And on some level, if death were the more potent force, life could never have arisen. But given the improbability of it’s happening at all, life seems more clearly the victor in that match. What was “dead” about the universe apparently could not stop the proteins from dallying together, could not stop those one celled alga from forming and transforming themselves into multicellular creatures which would eventually take such breathtaking form and variety on our planet.

A few days ago your car might have been one of the many that were coated with mud from a rainstorm. Apparently there was a great deal of illegal alien Mexican desert soil that got picked up by the wind, was blown aloft into the clouds and over that execrable fence until it eventually fell with the rain in Texas. But while the mud was very visible, something even smaller was also included, and is frequently included, in rainstorms—bacteria. Life for bacteria is not particularly easy and they have very limited means for transporting themselves so that they might exploit untapped resources. Some bacteria take advantage of the fact that they are very light. They are so light that they are easily picked up by winds and lofted into the atmosphere. But there is a problem. Getting airborne was the easy part. How do they, being so light, get back down? Answer—rain.

Life is found everywhere on Earth. There are microorganisms in abundance, finding homes anywhere from the lips of lobsters to the lips of volcanoes. Life does follow some basic rules but look what it does with those rules, always, always pushing the envelope. Giraffes and human beings have the exact same number of vertebrae, seven in the neck and twelve in the chest. How preposterous is that? No more preposterous than a hippopotamus. The creation of life is certainly limited by the rules of physics but is apparently not the least bit hindered by having a lack of “imagination.”

So given the great potency of life, the wealth of tricks it has up its sleeve, and the boundless energy which it puts into its projects, one would think that we would rest easy in life’s certain victory over death. But of course, that is exactly the opposite of what we actually think. We can be nervous creatures, and, in fact, all sentient creatures seem to be nervous. All creatures hate being startled and a great many look as if they are constantly thinking, “I’m about to get eaten, I’m about to get eaten.” Well, there is a very good reason for that thought. Nature has very little preference for creatures that die except in a very few instances where the death of a mate ensures that the babies will survive. But at the same time nature has a very strong preference for creatures who are anxious that they could die at any moment. When you stop and think about it—it makes sense. Those who possessed little instinctive anxiety about potential threats to survival have been consistently weeded out of the gene pool. A homo sapiens who saw a tiger and said, “Let’s go pet the pretty kitty” did not live to pass their “pet the pretty kitty” genes onto the next generation. The ones who did contribute to our lineage were the ones who got very anxious and decided to go gather roots and berries some place else.

So we human beings have been selected over the course of millennia to be anxious about mortal danger—death. We are quite aware of the fact that there are so many ways by which we can become a victim. We receive daily reminders about the horrible or bizarre circumstances in which people die. This past week a 75 pound sting ray flew out of the water off the Florida coast and collided with a woman minding her own business in an open boat—killing her instantly. It doesn’t matter to our psyches how improbable such things are. After all, we are the ones who can readily turn a small ache into sustained anguish. We do not rest easy in the bosom of life. We have been bred to imagine that life is fragile, that we are fragile, that what is precious to us could be taken away so easily.

And, of course, it is the survival of life on an individual basis which we believe we care about the most. But is that as true as we might think it is? Are we confusing our evolutionary heritage which has selected us to be nervous about life, with what we really feel about life? This is the actual Easter question: which shall exercise dominion over our living; is it the awesome power of life or is it an unrelenting anxiety about the fragility of life? Is our life to be about living, or is it to be about avoiding death? While death may not seem to have the upper hand in the universe, does it have the upper hand in our living?

We all suffer from a form of poor arithmetic. If everyone had died the number of times when they thought they might there would not be a single human being on the planet. And if you think we have it bad, imagine what our ancient ancestors experienced as they watched the daylight slowly recede and the green leaves turn brown and fall to the earth. They must have worried,“Oh—we’re goners for sure this time!” So they would light those bonfires, pray to those evergreens, and literally hope to god that some sentient being was in charge of the entire process. That hope was forged on the premise that if there was a god in charge then they could at least make supplications or make sacrifices and not feel so utterly helpless as life seemed to slowly bleed out of the landscape.

We by contrast have the blessing of advanced consciousness. We know about astronomy. We know about biology. We are quite certain that spring will return. We know that the tilted Earth in its yearly course around the sun will ensure the lengthening of daylight. We know the bud will eventually burst and produce a new leaf. We even know that we are pretty powerless to stop this. And so, because we possess a greatly advanced knowledge about the actual process of life, about its vigor, its irrepressible drive and ingenuity, we don’t exhibit nearly the same degree of anxiety as did our ancient forebears about the power of life, right?

Wrong. We, no less than they, assume it is all so fleeting and could be whisked away. We no less than they need to be reminded of the power of life. So once each year we get a very potent message—all your anxiety, your fretting is exactly wrong. Look what happens! Life comes out of its hidden chambers and erupts in color and song. The entire world becomes ablaze with glory.

It could be said that the story about the resurrection of Jesus simply expresses a message that we have a hard time believing but is absolutely true, the message that life is more powerful than death. We are surrounded by the evidence yet our anxiety prevents us from seeing it in the rose, from hearing it in the squeals of children, from smelling it in the rain soaked earth, from feeling it in the soft caress of a warm spring breeze. Indeed, our great problem is that we just don’t believe what all our senses are telling us. But spring comes along and knocks some sense into our thick heads. Look! Listen! Smell! Feel! Wake up, rouse yourself! The message, if we but have eyes to see and ears to hear is unmistakable. Life is so much more potent than our small fears. How many reasons for feeling delighted do you need or would be enough to finally persuade your wintry heart? There is abundance, there is vitality, there is the incredible urge to send out leaves, and bring forth life. You cannot stop it, you are powerless to stop it. It will happen no matter your fears or sorrow. Yes you will die. But does that negate life itself? Hardly. Because what you love most—that will not die. That toward which your heart is inclined—that will not die. That which you think is profoundly important—that will not die.

Let me explain. Every time I call my father now, he says, “Yes I’m getting along but I really am tired and do not feel I need to live any longer.” I protest but should know better. He’s lived a long time, and he’s added greatly to the well being of so many people. He’s strived hard for good things and now he thinks, “Hey, it’s time for somebody else.” “Me,” he says, “I’ve done my part. Your turn.” He’s dying, and he feels unrelenting gratitude. He says, “I’ve seen so much, I’ve had so many chances to add my two cents worth of sense into this dream of humanity. I’m a lucky man.” Yes he is, and so are we all. He is dying and I don’t like it. But I am grateful too. Whatever good he’s done, and they are things in abundance, they will last, they will endure far after the time he finds his rest. They will endure in me, in my brothers, our children, in all the people he’s touched, all the things toward which he turned his hand and inclined his heart. That, too, is the nature of things. He cannot stop that, I cannot stop that. You cannot stop that. It turns out that we are all helpless to resist the good things.

That’s how life works. It’s pretty ingenious when you stop and think about it. So please do. Wake up, rouse thyself. Hey, it’s your turn.