IT seems hardly possible that it is already the middle of April. The daffodils have been out and are now past their best. Spring sown crops of corn are looking promising, with their straight green rows, and potatoes are being planted as fast as everyone can manage.

Next weekend is Easter. Due to the vagaries of the Christian calendar, Easter is late this year, so late that some schools' summer term starts on Easter Tuesday. There are calls for a set pattern, so that administration is easier. It makes it a bit like May Day, whose date anyone can predict.

I quite like the variability of Easter. It is one of the traditional dates by which certain gardening and farming jobs were supposed to be done, however the seasons vary. I do not have to administer my way around the school problems. I only stand at the side holding opinions, which is much the easier part.

The season of Easter is one of the most important Christian festivals. Traditionally it was one of the times when attendance at church was more or less expected. The decline in churchgoing since the last war has been substantial. It seems that most people now attend church, not for the Christian festivals such as Christmas and Easter, but for the festivals in their own lives, such as baptisms, weddings and funerals.

At least on those occasions they do attend, but the trend towards strictly secular celebrations, with weddings held in registry offices or hotels, and funerals at crematoria, looks, at the moment, to be irreversible.

Most people seem to find the teachings of the Church irrelevant to the lives they lead. That is the greatest problem. It is possible to promote a cause, whatever it is, if thoughts and discussions can be provoked. If people do not think that the subject is even worth thinking about the task is huge.

The newly installed Archbishop of Canterbury has one of the most challenging jobs in the kingdom.

I think that people behaved better towards one another when the Church played a greater part in their lives. I do not believe that this is nostalgia, though there is always a tendency to believe that things are getting worse, however that is defined. We all know that existence was harsher in the past. We have advanced in a material sense and have come a long way since life was correctly described as "nasty, brutish and short".

The decline of the religious way of life has resulted in a vacuum, which has not been filled. We are supposed to be kind to our neighbours, however we define them, but that is the end of the commitment. We have set ourselves up as the final judges.

So Easter, like Christmas, has become a commercial exercise. Flower sales, mostly of imported flowers, must be huge over the festival. Easter eggs seem to be available for longer and longer. Those excellent cream-filled Easter eggs, with increasingly quirky advertising, can be bought almost year round. I used to pay for most of their advertising, until waistline considerations caused me to stop.

Perhaps the major stores are the new churches. We all flock there at certain times and do their bidding. We take our families, meet our friends and feel better when we have been. For some, retail therapy seems to be a wonderful thing.

It would be nice if when having the therapy, attention could be paid to buying locally produced goods. The opportunities are increasing, and it is a real help. However you choose to celebrate it, have a happy Easter.

Updated: 11:16 Tuesday, April 15, 2003