Celebrating Easter in Greece!

One of the greatest celebrations of Christianity is Easter and in Greece, the Christians follow the Holy Week ritual devoutly.

On Maundy Thursday the preparations for the celebration of the Resurrection start on that day. Housewives traditionally prepare the Easter brioche (“tsoureki”) and dye eggs with special red dyes, a custom that symbolises the rebirth of life and nature. On Good Friday, people decorate the Epitaph with flowers. On this day, the devout Christians are supposed not to eat anything. The Epitaph Mass takes place in the evening and then follows the circumambulation where people join the procession on its way through the streets of every single village and city listening to chanters and psalms.

On Easter Saturday morning, preparations start for the festive dinner which follows the Resurrection night. The housewives cook “maghiritsa” (a soup with lamb offal and herbs). Before midnight, people gather in church holding candles. They light them up with the “Holy Light”. The Resurrection of Christ is celebrated at 12.00 with bells beating and many fireworks. Then they all gather around the festively table, where the eat the traditional soup “maghiritsa” and they crack red eggs. 

On Easter Sunday morning, in many parts of the country lamb is prepared on the spit. In some regions, the meat for the Easter table is roasted in the oven.

Easter celebrations are exciting all over Greece. Some of the most famous destinations are Corfu, Skiathos, Patmos, Chios, Leonidio and Monemvasia. 

Spending Easter on Skiathos is considered to be a spiritual experience, as the locals and the tourists have the opportunity to observe the monastery ritual of Mount Athos and live the Passion Week.

In Corfu you can enjoy exciting religious celebrations, such as the ecclesiastical hymns of the Passion Week performed by the Municipal Chorus and the decoration of the Epitaphs by young girls accompanied by choruses and bands.

During the Passion Week on Patmos, the Island where the Apocalypse had been written, visitors can observe the practice of the preserved Early Christian traditions like “The Washing of the Disciples’ Feet” and the Reenactment of the Deposition from the Cross in the Monastery of St. John.
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Magnificent Easter festivities are taking place in Chios, too. On the night of the Holy Saturday a rocket war breaks out, which dates from the Ottoman occupation of Greece (15th-19th centuries) and turns this village into a virtual battlefield.

During Easter time in Leonidio the tourists can watch the spectacular custom of the balloons that is more than one century old.

On Easter Sunday evening, in the medieval fortress town of Monemvasia in the courtyard of Elkomenos Christ Church, you can observe the ancient-old ritual of “Judas Burning” reviving: an effigy of Judas made by wood and straw, filled with explosives which are set on fire!