…Deacon Steve Greydanus is here to provide Illumination as well as brain-melting facts about George Washington’s Birthday and Independence Day which, as we all know, should properly be on June 23 in Protestant Murka:
Sunset this evening—Saturday, 12 April, 2025—marks the beginning of the Jewish feast of Passover; sunset is also, for both Western Catholics and Eastern Christians, exactly one week from the beginning of the Easter Vigil or Paschal Vigil next Saturday evening.1
Why exactly are Passover and Easter, so to speak, in the same orbit, even if they don’t always coincide? Why does the Eastern Orthodox celebration of Christ’s resurrection—Pascha, as Easter is also called, not only by the Orthodox, but also by Catholics speaking nearly all languages other than English and German—usually diverge from the Western celebration by one to five weeks?
The short answer is … I mean, there is no short answer, it’s complicated! As I joked six years ago on Facebook:
In reality, this was an oversimplification, as I will explain. How does it all work? Let’s take it from the top!
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4 Responses
I’m just bummed Easter didn’t fall on that transgender day again.
It gave the fascists such a case of the vapors!!
What is a transgender day? That sounds puzzling.
It’s one of those “day of visibility” things.
MAGA Christians had a meltdown last year when Easter fell on the same date. They accused the LGBT of going out of their way to upstage Jesus.
In reality, the two events only coincide roughy four times a century and nobody was prevented from celebrating Easter.
Thank you.