Hey, Who Put Jesus Into Easter?

Last Saturday, the day before Easter, we got up and went over to the school gymnasium for the much advertised Community Easter Egg Hunt.
When we got there, the place was pretty packed-- parents in the bleachers, and an impressive table of prizes: tall pink plastic wrapped easter egg baskets, heaps of pastel chocolates, and even a pair of new bikes. We registered at the front-- filling out a form that asked for our phone, our address, our full names, birthdays, and which church we go to, and how often. I was suddenly dubious that this really is a nondenominational community event.
In exchange for all of our personal information, baby got a little green wrist band that let her into the 0-3 egg hunt at 9:00. It was still 8:30 and the place was filling up.
A woman stood up in the front by the prizes and shouted into a wireless karaoke mic, "Hey everybody, ready to celebrate Easter??? Come on kids, come up to the front! Let's celebrate Jesus!" All the kids shuffled out to the floor in front of her. She put on a DVD of rowdy kid's rock and roll, with a loud screaming and cheering track-- it suddenly seems much livelier in the gym. The pounding music starts up: "J-E-S-U-S!!!!" The kids jump around and watch the tie-dye graphics undulate on the huge screen under pump-you-up Christian lyrics like, "I think I'm gonna throw up, I think I'm gonna throw up, I think I'm gonna throw up-- my hands and praise the Lord!"
9:00 arrives and the throng is getting restless. We're following baby through the crowd, greeting people from work and church and our birth class, and recognizing the nice grocery store clerk and Diane the copy store owner, and the cheery barista at the corner coffee shop, who is sitting pensively with a cigarette.
The music is losing some of its power (in spite of catchy ditties like, "who's the king of the jungle? Hoo Hoo! Who's the king of the sea? Glub Glub! Jesus is the King of the universe and Jesus is the king of me, Yee-haw!!!!")
At last he DVD goes off and a kid with a mic is climbing a ladder. The MC says, "Hey, what are you doing????" The kid hams, "I'm trying to climb to heaven!" "What??? you can't climb into heaven!" Then the kid pulls out a dollar bill and waves it at her: "well, can I buy my way into heaven?" "No! The only way to go to heaven is to believe in Jesus!" Here she turns to the audience and blats into the mic-- "who here believes in Jesus, raise your hands!!" A smattering of kids raise their hands, and their neighbors watch them and tentatively join in. A couple of little girls in pigtails raise their hands, and their mom gently pulled their hands back in their laps, shaking her head at them.
"The only way to go to heaven," the MC says, "is to ABC! A-- Admit you are a sinner, then B, Believe in Christ, and C, Confess Christ is your savior. So who wants to go to heaven? Repeat after me!!!! I am a sinner!" she sing-songs. The kids echo her. "I believe in Jesus! I accept Jesus into my heart!"
So then the whole gymnasium was saved, and the doors were opened and the antsy (but redeemed) throng was herded to a flat open field, marked with neon orange plastic tape, and scattered with plastic eggs. The pastor came out (in a black t-shirt with a gothic cross on) and blew an air horn, and the children descended onto the eggs.
Phew, finally down to the real business of Easter! Plastic eggs and cheap candy.