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Experience the meaning of Easter at downtown Trail church

First Presbyterian Church is located at 1139 Pine Ave.
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Reverend Meridyth shows the Good Friday station set up in First Presbyterian Church. (Sheri Regnier photo)

The First Presbyterian Church is inviting families to experience Easter in a whole new way by taking a symbolic “Walk with Jesus” in downtown Trail this week.

Read more: What is the true meaning of Easter?

On Good Friday, from 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m., Reverends Meridyth and Gavin Robertson, along with their congregation, are offering one last chance to tour through meaningful displays, called stations, that are set up inside the church.

Tours will begin every 15 minutes and last about one hour.

“Kids and their families will experience the most amazing and thought provoking Easter journey as they travel through five stations,” Reverend Meridyth began..

“They will experience the excitement surrounding Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem, the significance of the Last Supper, the darkness at Gethsemane, the sacrifice Jesus made on the cross, and the joy of His resurrection.”

The tour ends in the Walk with Jesus Café where families can enjoy a snack and talk about their experience.

The congregational group works behind the scenes to put together a new event every few years, as a way to guide the community through the biblical story of Easter. So it doesn’t embrace the commercial message of chocolate eggs, chicks and the Easter Bunny.

Instead of sweets, the Reverend says teaching scripture in an engaging way is especially valuable at Easter. That’s because Easter is the most significant event in the Christian year, but it doesn’t receive the same attention as Christmas.

“Because it is a month long, we always find that people are exposed to both the secular aspect of Christmas and the religious aspect of Christmas,” she explained.

“There isn’t a season in the store for Easter, other than shelf after shelf of chocolate eggs and bunnies. There are no songs played in stores to make us think about Easter, other than perhaps, ‘Here comes Peter Cottontail,’” Meridyth continued.

“You would have to go to church to hear songs such as ‘Up From the Grave He Arose’ and ‘Jesus Christ is Risen Today,’ to know what Easter is really all about.”

Kids get chocolate, chocolate, chocolate, and egg hunts because that’s what is seen in stores, the Reverend shared.

“So when we talked about doing an interactive event and invite the community, we wanted to do something for Easter because we want kids and families to realize that Easter is about Jesus’ death and resurrection not about the Easter bunny and chocolate.

“As the stations go in Walk with Jesus, it’s really (representing) that last week of Jesus’ life.”

Since arriving in Trail in 1996, Reverends Gavin and Meridyth Robertson have ministered to the congregation of First Presbyterian Church as well as the community at-large.

Reverend Gavin is the Padre for the 39th Combat Engineer Regiment and Reverend Meridyth is a volunteer chaplain for Kootenay Boundary Regional Hospital, and Padre for the Royal Canadian Legion Branch #11.



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At The Resurrection station, guest are invited to write down a sin on a special type of paper. The paper is then put in a glass where it dissolves with water. (Sheri Regnier photo)
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Last Supper station. (Sheri Regnier photo)


Sheri Regnier

About the Author: Sheri Regnier

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