Recently I was asked,
“Why does Easter move anyway?”
I knew I had learned
this at one time, but I also knew I did not remember.
Other than knowing it
had something to do with the moon, I could not articulate my answer.
We know the date for
Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and St. Patrick ’s Day—but Easter, well that one
moves.
Here is the short
answer:
Easter falls on the
first Sunday after the first full moon on or after the vernal equinox, unless
the full moon falls on a Sunday, then it is delayed a week.
Is your head hurting
yet?
The vernal equinox is
the Spring Equinox- March 21.
March 22 is the
earliest Easter can occur on any given year, and April 25 is the latest.
You may be wondering,
as I did, just how this formula got put into place.
Easter and Passover
Easter was once
determined by the date of Passover.
Jesus celebrated
Passover with his disciples.
Passover celebrates
how the Israelites, when slaves in Egypt, were protected by the blood of the
lamb across their doorways, as death passed over them during the plague. Because of the blood of the lamb they were
protected and liberated. God saved them
and brought them to freedom through the sea.
That Passover meal
became the Last Supper where Jesus instituted the sacrament Holy Communion.
Here in this meal
Jesus shared the new covenant offering forgiveness, love, and grace. In the New Covenant Jesus shared a four part
blessing—he took the bread, blessed it, broke it, and gave it to
his disciples.
His life was taken,
blessed, broken, and given so that we
would have new life in this new covenant, forgiven, and made new.
Jesus became the
Paschal Lamb, whose blood would protect us, free us, and lead us to new
life.
On that night Jesus
was betrayed and the next day he was crucified and on the third day he rose
again.
In this way, Easter is
connected theologically to Passover.
A Little History
But the date became no longer dependent upon
Passover at the Council of Nicaea.
This was the first
ecumenical gathering of the Christian Church where the church uniformly came
together to agree upon doctrine which is articulated in the Nicaean Creed.
At this meeting the Church
also argued over the reliability of dating mechanisms and chose to no longer
use the Jewish Calendar to determine
Easter. Instead they began to calculate the
date using the Julian Calendar whereby the date would be calculated using the
date from spring equinox so that Easter would be the first Sunday following the
full moon after the spring equinox.
The Church continued this
practice calculating Easter with the Julian Calendar until the 1500’s when the
church realized that their reliance on this calendar was causing them to
incorrectly date the spring equinox (the
spring equinox is the one day in spring when there is exactly
12 hours of sunlight and 12 hours of darkness).
The Julian calendar
assumes the year is exactly 365.25 days long. Unfortunately, the actual solar
year is slightly shorter (it is 365.242199 days to be exact). Although the
difference appears minor, it can add up over the centuries. In fact, every 129
years, the Julian calendar slipped one additional day out of synchronization
with the actual solar year.
So if the date for
Easter was off- then Lent, Ash Wednesday, Pentecost would so be off.
To correct this, Pope Gregory
XIII, issued a papal bull in 1582 that resulted in several calendar revisions,
the most important being the creation of the Gregorian calendar. [i]
The Western Church
decided to use a Gregorian Calendar system, while the Easter Orthodox continued
to use a Julian Calendar. So the date for Easter, for the Roman
Catholic Church and Protestant Church continues to be set using this
calculation, while the Eastern Orthodox Church continues to use the Julian
Calendar.
Who is Easter Really About?
However the Church has
begun to talk about creating a set date for Easter . The Archbishop of Canterbury has said that it
would help schools and families to arrange terms and holidays. [ii]
Having a set date
certainly would help us arrange our schedules
and plan our lives. And I’m definitely glad that the spring break
in Chesterfield County falls the week after
Easter this year, rather than the week of Holy Week, so that families can
worship through the week at church on Palm Sunday, Holy Thursday, Good Friday,
and Easter.
Yet, something in me
finds the fact that Easter moves a good thing.
The purpose of Lent is
for us to refocus and stop putting ourselves first, to repent and believe the
Gospel remembering that we are dust and it is Christ who give us life—new life!
Moving Easter for our convenience, seems to me to contrary
to the reason for Lent.
Perhaps when Easter
messes up our schedules, it is a good
thing.
We have to repent and reorient
ourselves.
Every year, we have to ask ourselves, “When is
Easter?” And perhaps that may become the
start of our Lenten practice? Have our habits and spiritual disciplines become
old, worn, rote even?
When
is Easter and how can we reorient our lives to be in line with the meaning of Easter,
rather than move Easter be in line with our desires.
Jesus Christ comes and
makes everything new!
When the date of
Easter changes each year—we have to shift and be made new.
Nothing stays the
same, except for the steadfast love of God.
We drift away filing
our lives with our plans and our purposes.
We create our life, and in so doing we forget how
Christ gave His life for us.
Easter this year is on
March 27, and the 40 days leading to this day begin Lent.
On February 9, I hope
to see you for Shrove Tuesday as we begin putting Christ first in our schedule
and plans and walking with our Savior first in our schedule.
The next day, February
10 is Ash Wednesday, we will place the ashes burnt from last Palm Sunday’s
palms as the sign of the cross on our heads, humbling ourselves, remembering
who we are- from ashes we came and from ashes will we return, and knowing that
when we repent and believe the Gospel we have new life. We will offer a Children’s Ash Wednesday
Service at 6:30 and a Traditional Ash Wednesday Service at 7:30 so that people
of all ages are able to experience and understand the power of this humbling
service.
Each Wednesday throughout
Lent we will offer Lenten Lunches at noon at church. We will have be having a time of fellowship sharing
in soup and bread and then we will worship together.
The First Sunday of
Lent is February 14 and we will begin our Lenten Series “A New Normal.” We begin our “New Normal” series recommitting
ourselves and renewing our covenant in line with the New Covenant Jesus
offers.
February 14 is also
Valentine’s Day!
Could your relationship use a new normal-- a
revival of the heart- a re- commitment and renewal?
Following the 11:00am worship service we will offer an opportunity for
couples to Renew the Covenant of their Marriage. We will have extended
childcare on this day and we invite all couples, whether you have been marred
40 years or 4 years to not only recommit your lives to Christ in this worship
service, but also recommit to the covenant of your marriage.
Christ
has come with a New Covenant, New Wineskins, New Birth, New Commandment, a New
Understanding, a New Kingdom, and New Life!
I
pray that throughout this Lent we will all take the opportunity to develop a
New Normal in Christ Jesus our Savior!
In
God’s Love, Grace, and Peace
Pastor Beth
[i] The new Gregorian calendar had an extra day in those years that
were divisible by 4 (just like the old Julian calendar), but unlike the Julian
calendar, it did not add an additional day in years that were divisible by 100,
unless the year was also divisible by 400. Thus, under the Gregorian calendar,
the years 1700, 1800 and 1900 were not leap years, but the years 1600 and 2000
were leap years.
• To make up for the
errors in the old Julian calendar, ten days were omitted from the new Gregorian
calendar. Thus, Thursday, 4 October 1582 in the old Julian calendar was
immediately followed by Friday, 15 October 1582 in the new Gregorian calendar.
[ii] http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/the-times/churches-unite-to-seek-a-fixed-date-for-easter/news-story/504f1ebef5b5678cd6302fd637f61cd0
