There’s never been an Easter like it. All the churches in Britain were closed, and family parties, day trips and holidays cancelled. Beaches and parks that would have been packed on every other sunny, hot bank holiday were this year deserted.

Priests tended to their congregations in new ways. My great friend Anthony Beer is priest at Laleston and Merthyr Mawr near Bridgend in South Wales. This Easter Anthony held Eucharist on Easter Day in the vicarage garden – as you can tell from the photo on the left, it was a very different congregation this year. (By contrast, one Easter at nearby Wick Anthony brought two lambs to church on Easter Day, as seen in the second photo!) Anthony like so many other priests is ministering to his flock by phone, email and social media.

As Anthony remarked, the Easter story is of being transported from sadness and darkness to joy and happiness. Millions around the world will have prayed and hoped for happier times around the corner.

What a contrast to Easter 2019. A year ago, we were staying in my hometown, Cardiff. On Easter Day, I cycled to our favourite Welsh beach, Dunraven, Southerndown. It was a gorgeous spring day, much like this year’s Easter weather, and I revelled in exploring familiar countryside by bike not car. I even discovered an abandoned pub, the Cross Inn near Llantrithyd, which closed in 1939 after 239 years.

Easter Day 2019

I close this post with a photo that captured that joy of the setting of the sun after a beautiful day. This classic E Type Jaguar was parked outside my father’s then home on the Esplanade, Penarth, Vale of Glamorgan. Presumably this Easter this lovely car was standing silently at home, waiting for life to return to normal.

As Anthony remarked on Easter Day 2020, the Easter story transports us from sadness and darkness to joy and happiness. Millions around the world will be hoping and praying that happier times are around the corner.