Easter Celebrations Highlight the Importance of Hope

April 24, 2025

Every year, during Easter week, Mercy Home’s young people and coworkers gather to celebrate Easter together. This year’s celebration was centered around the idea of hope, both in our own lives and as reflected by the Resurrection of Jesus on Easter Sunday.

Events at both of our boys and girls’ homes began with spiritual celebrations. This year, youth speakers shared personal reflections on hope and what it means to them. Marc Velasquez, the director of milieu training and cultural-spiritual engagement at Mercy Home, prepared a slideshow with quotes from each young person’s speech to accompany the presentation.

“Truly who has helped me find my inner hope and spark again is all the staff in Couderc Home,” Dania said. “They’ve had my back no matter what, especially my advocate, Dorothy.”

Many of the youth spoke about the ways Mercy Home helped them find reasons to be hopeful even in difficult situations.

“I became a hopeful person once I found Mercy,” Tyreese said. “Mercy helped me keep hope in darkness. Mercy helped me find the courage to keep going when my life got hard. … To me, hope is being yourself, living your life against all odds, and working toward a life that you never had.”

“I’ve been looking for a while for hope,” he said. “The world is a really tough place, and we’re bombarded with a lot of difficulty, a lot of challenge, a lot of negativity, a lot of things that just don’t seem or are simply not right. And to maintain a sense of encouragement takes hope.”

Fr. Scott then directed everyone’s attention a painting, “The Disciples Peter and John Running to the Sepulchre on the Morning of the Resurrection” by Eugene Burnand, which depicts Peter and John running to Jesus’s empty tomb on Easter morning. While Peter is skeptical and confused about what he is seeing, John is filled with hope and immediately understands what the empty tomb means. It depicts the moment fear becomes hope.

“Hope becomes stronger,” Fr. Scott said. “The hope of the Resurrection, the hope that we all have for one another, the hope that we have for the world always wins. Light overcomes darkness, and that’s what the Easter season is all about.”

Following Fr. Scott’s reflection, everyone dug into a delicious Easter meal of chicken, ham, potatoes, veggies, rolls, and desserts.

Following their dinner, our young women participated in another special tradition: the Easter egg hunt. The front lawn outside the girls’ home was strewn with hundreds of colorful eggs packed with candy. Everyone had a great time collecting the hidden treasures, and six young people were especially lucky, having found the coveted golden eggs that could be traded in for gift cards.

Each event ended with our kids receiving Easter baskets from our friends at Fill a Heart 4 Kids, the perfect way to conclude a special, inspiring night spent celebrating together. The nonprofit organization provides a wide variety of care and support that helps transform holidays into special experiences to help children feel loved and remembered and has donated Easter baskets for several years.