Poll: few Czechs think of Easter in a religious context

Czechs think of Easter more as a festival to mark the arrival of spring than as a religious holiday, a poll conducted by the Median agency for Saturday’s edition of Lidové noviny suggests. Nearly 50 percent of those polled said that they thought of Easter as the start of a new season, while considerably less said that they thought of Easter as a commemoration of Christ’s death - only 18 percent of respondents said that they would be attending church to mark the festival. The survey suggested that Easter traditions are alive and well in the Czech Republic, with around 60 percent of those polled saying that they would be painting Easter eggs, and around the same amount linking the festival with the whipping of women, an age-old Czech custom at Easter time.