It's one of those oddities of being a non-Christian broadcaster, that you often get used during Christian celebrations because the Christians are all too busy doing their thing. But just as it was always necessary to be especially sensitive when dealing with news of child murder and the like, it felt much the same when having the responsibility of taking my turn on Good Friday. Fortunately, the Christians all seemed quite happy for me to do it, so I like to think that as a muslim I must have been doing something right.

You know I really don’t like Christmas very much. Even as a non-Christian I feel not just saddened but offended that the celebratory aspect of the Christian message has been so overwhelmed, returning to something more resembling the solstice Saturnalia which it replaced – a celebration of Christ by consumption.

Easter doesn’t have quite that detachment from the Christian message yet, though for many it’s clearly more to do with going on holiday, or chocolate bunnies and Easter eggs. But Easter has greater protection from the forces of commercialism than Christmas. It has its association with Good Friday.

Now even the most insensitive and unconcerned of commercial businesses has to think twice before trying to trivialise Good Friday. For this day is an example of one of the great tragedies of the human condition. We share the nature of those who would torture and kill the most gentle of men, for no more than that they speak of a truth we don’t want to hear. Suffering and death will come to us also, and challenge us as to the meaning of our lives.

When we celebrate the new life of a birth, we tend to avoid sobering thoughts of death’s inevitability. But birth and death are just gateways to and from our lives, and the journey between is there for us to understand that final moment. We are given our lives to practice, and each day we face the little death of sleep, and daily we are reborn.

And every moment is a little death of the possibilities of life that were in the moment before. New birth requires death, and without the mirror of suffering we could have no joy or celebration. And there may often be much laughter at a funeral, being a celebration of a life that was lived, but it is always protected from mindless frivolity by its anchor in our mortality.

Qur’an says “And We sent, following in their footsteps, Jesus son of Mary,  confirming the Torah before him; and We gave to him the Gospel, wherein is guidance and light, … And We set in the hearts of those who followed him tenderness and mercy.”

Happy Easter.