The US Census Bureau: [Easter Dates from 1600 to 2099 ](https://www.census.gov/data/software/x13as/genhol/easter-dates.html) describes the date of Easter from the years 1600 to 2099. There is a noticeable movement of the date from one year to another, ranging from the third week of March to the fourth week of April. Easter is celebrated on the first Sunday after the Paschal full moon (a mathematical approximation of the first astronomical full moon, on or after 21 March – itself a fixed approximation of the March equinox). This formula for deciding the date was fixed with a view to making Good Friday coincide with Nisan 14 on the Jewish calendar, the date on which Jesus was crucified. But the coincidence rarely happens. This year, Nisan 14 falls on Saturday, the 12th of April, whereas Good Friday falls on the 18th of April. My question is: Has the Catholic Church ever considered an alternative formula for deciding the date of Easter?

A popular view is that Jesus was crucified on Friday, 14th Nisan, 3rd April AD 33. This is the Julian date. The Gregorian date is 1st April. Interestingly, 1st April 2033 will be a Friday. The current way of calculating the date of Easter is related to the Full Moon, which ties Easter rather more to the Passover events of the Exodus from Egypt than to the crucifixion. What discussions have there been in any major denomination about trying to tie the date more emphatically to a date of the crucifixion rather than to Passover? Has there been any review, especially in modern times, of this issue?

On the note of soon to pass Good Friday, Good Friday is the time of the year where we remember the death of Jesus, and Easter is where we remember the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. Correct me if I am wrong. However, people seem to associate Easter with egg hunting and bunnies and chocolates. I wouldn't mind a little celebration considering that it is the day Jesus rose from the dead, however I would like to know what in the world eggs and bunnies have to do with it.

Since we know that Yeshua was born during the time of Herod, and Herod died shortly after the lunar eclipse on January 10th, 1 BC, we can use this as a reference point for the birth and death of Yeshua. In Matthew 12:40, Yeshua mentions being in the grave for "three days and three nights," just as Jonah was in the belly of the fish. Celebrating from Friday to Sunday does not fulfill this timeframe. Yeshua, adhering to Torah, would have begun his ministry at the age of 30, around 31 AD. He was crucified the next Passover. Why follow a timeline known to be incorrect? The death of Christ aligns with Passover, allowing us to accurately date and celebrate His sacrifice on Passover each year. In 31 AD, Passover fell on a Wednesday, and Yeshua was crucified that day. He rose early on Saturday morning (the Sabbath), fulfilling the "three days and three nights" prophecy. The Council of Laodicea shifted the focus away from the Sabbath, a commandment unrelated to the "New" Covenant but still a commandment. Dismissing one of the Ten Commandments makes little sense. Avoiding shared observances with Jews is not a valid reason. Celebrating with symbols like bunnies and eggs, or Christmas trees, mixes pagan traditions with Christian observances, deviating from the Word of God and adhering to human traditions instead of scripture. Both Christmas and Easter are man-made holidays. According to Genesis 1, a new day begins at sunset, a principle that should remain unchanged as God's Law is eternal. --- The question is why is the tradition of Easter "Friday to Sunday" when passover is on a wednesday?

When did the early Christians celebrate the second Easter? Did it fall on the same day as the Jewish Pasch (Sabbath day / Saturday) or on the next day (Sunday)?

The Presentation of the Lord is celebrated exactly 40 days after Christmas, yet Christmas ends on the Baptism of the Lord, which is the beginning of Ordinary Time. Why is the Christmas season short when compared to the Easter season, which is celebrated for 50 days? How was it decided that the day celebrating the Lord's baptism marked the end of Christmas?

Jehovah's Witnesses are well known for avoiding most if not all religious holiday celebrations. Most reasons center on the apparent linkage of these celebrations with various pagan celebrations and feasts celebrated by non-Jews before Jesus came to earth and established Christianity. What specifically do JWs say about the Easter holiday and its origins and what (if anything) the Bible has to say about celebrating Easter?

How do the 1962 Holy Week ceremonies, initiated by Pius XII's 1955 Holy Week reforms, compare to the 1954 ones? cf. FIUV 's - PP 14: Holy Week Reform of 1955, Part I - General Comments - PP 14: Holy Week Reform of 1955, Part II - Liturgies

I was approached by two Jehovah's Witnesses who invited me to a memorial service for Jesus to be held on Tuesday, March 26th. The flier they gave me said that this is the anniversary of Jesus' death. Most Christians view Christ's death as taking place on Good Friday. Why are Jehovah's Witnesses saying it happened on a Tuesday?

The Jewish calendar calculates a day from sunset to sunset, thus the Last Supper (on the Thursday evening) and Jesus' crucifixion (on Friday afternoon) *happened in the same day*. In John Gospel this day was the 14th of Nisan (April 3, 33 CE) of the Jewish calendar; In the three Synoptic Gospels the Last Supper is a Passover meal so Jesus' crucifixion must have taken place during the afternoon of the festival itself, the 15th of Nisan (April 4, 33 CE). Both dates obviously can not be true. Which date is correct?

The Catholic Church often refers to the Mass, or the Sacrifice of the Mass, as the "Paschal Mystery", a reflection on the events that took place in the near vicinity of Jesus' crucifixion. What does the Paschal Mystery really mean? And what does it reflect upon?

Since we'll probably never have a TLM Mass at my parish for any of the Easter celebrations, I wanted to ask what the differences would be, but the differences seem to be too many to enumerate so I guess I'd like to concentrate on what the similarities are (i.e. if you time-travelled to 1962 what would you recognize). The main points of the Easter Triduum celebrations as far as I see it are (in the NO) Holy Thursday: 1. Washing Feet on Thursday 2. Moving Jesus out of the tabernacle to an altar of repose Good Friday: 3. Passion on Good Friday 4. Lots of standing and kneeling during intercessions 5. Veneration of the Cross Holy Saturday: 6. Lighting of the Easter Candle and procession in 7. Easter Proclamation 8. Readings in the Dark 9. Very happy Gloria with lots of Bells and Candles 10. Baptisms, Confirmations etc.. 11. Renewal of Baptismal promises If there's anything important I missed, please add it to your answer and I'll put it in the question as well. What I want to know is, are there movements in the Mass that have been taken out, added or adapted in the Novus Ordo and how do they compare to their traditional counterparts.

I have always wondered why we celebrate Easter only two 24 hour periods since Good Friday. Throughout Scripture we see the Apostles and Paul talking about Jesus's Resurrection was three days after his crucifixion according to the Scriptures (1 Corinthians 15:4). I feel like I read somewhere that a day back in the 1st Century meant something different than what we believe in the 21st Century. This should be something that we are taught when we are young instead of me asking when I turn 17 in 2 months.

During the course of my search into the origins of ‘Resurrection Sunday’ I found some interesting information, but mainly to do with the name ‘Easter’: >The naming of the celebration as “Easter” seems to go back to the name of a pre-Christian goddess in England, Eostre, who was celebrated at beginning of spring. The only reference to this goddess comes from the writings of the Venerable Bede, a British monk who lived in the late seventh and early eighth century. As religious studies scholar Bruce Forbes summarizes: >***“Bede wrote that the month in which English Christians were celebrating the resurrection of Jesus had been called Eosturmonath in Old English, referring to a goddess named Eostre. And even though Christians had begun affirming the Christian meaning of the celebration, they continued to use the name of the goddess to designate the season.”*** >Bede was so influential for later Christians that the name stuck, and hence Easter remains the name by which the English, Germans and Americans refer to the festival of Jesus’ resurrection. https://theconversation.com/why-easter-is-called-easter-and-other-little-known-facts-about-the-holiday-75025 From an informative Wikipedia article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter I found this reference to ‘Resurrection Sunday’: >Footnote The term "Resurrection Sunday" is used particularly by Christian communities in the Middle East. Orthodox, Catholic, and all Reformed churches in the Middle East celebrate Easter according to the Eastern calendar, calling this holy day "Resurrection Sunday," not Easter. It seems to me that the term ‘Easter Sunday’ originated in the seventh or eighth century in England. ***I don’t know when the first day of the week was called Sunday, but when did Christians start to use the expression ‘Resurrection Sunday’?*** There seems to be a connection with Christian churches in the Middle East. Edit: It must be obvious that the earliest christians had never heard of 'Easter' because that term did not come into existence till about the 8th century. I found this reference: >The celebration of this event, called Easter, ***or the Festival of the Resurrection***, is the major feast day of the church. https://www.britannica.com/topic/resurrection-religion And another: >Easter celebrates the Resurrection of Jesus Christ on the third day after his Crucifixion. ***The earliest recorded observance of an Easter celebration comes from the 2nd century, though the commemoration of Jesus’ Resurrection probably occurred earlier.*** https://www.britannica.com/topic/Easter-holiday Is 'Resurrection Sunday' a modern invention? Or does it pre-date the name Easter?

Christians commonly celebrate Good Friday as the day that Jesus was crucified, and Easter Sunday as the day that Jesus rose from the tomb. Most relevant verses in scripture say that Jesus would be in the tomb for three days. (See Matthew 26:61 ; Mark 8:31 ; John 2:19 .) However, one verse states that Jesus would also be in the tomb for three nights: > For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the > belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three > nights in the heart of the earth. (Matthew 12:40) How can this be? Friday to Sunday could be considered three days, but it is only two nights. I've heard it explained before that the Jewish people would define the end of one day and the start of the next as sundown, or about the 12th hour. This is why the Sabbath would always start on Friday at sundown. Jesus was buried just before sundown, or just before the Sabbath began (Matthew 27:57-61 ; Mark 15:42-47 ; Luke 23:50-56 , John 19:38-42 ). This can explain the three days, but as the other commenter pointed out, it still does not explain the three nights.

The [Exsultet](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exsultet) or Exultet is a beautiful Latin hymn for the Easter vigil. There are a few different versions. Part of the ceremony involves lighting the Paschal candle, and the text thanks the bees who produced the wax: > *Alitur enim liquantibus ceris, quas in substantiam pretiosiae huius lampadis apis mater eduxit.* > > For [the candle] is fed by melting wax, drawn out by mother bees to build a torch so precious.1 The candle is also called "the work of bees and of your servants' hands" in another part of the text. Of course it is nice to recognize the contribution of the bees. But this feels like a bit of a digression in a hymn which is otherwise all about God. Is there some reason why bees are specifically mentioned? 1. English rendering from the International Commission for English in the Liturgy, 2010.

In the Catholic world, Holy Thursday is mostly celebrated with a mass, the Mass of the Lord's Supper, where the Washing of the Feet is performed. The liturgical texts concentrate on those events and do not focus on the following episodes (the visit to the garden of Gethsemane and betrayal and arrest of Jesus). And yet, after the mass, the altar is stripped and statues and crucifixes are covered, to prepare for the next day. I've recently found the celebrations of that day a bit wanting in the sense that, while I go home and do my life, Jesus "is" in the garden praying, being betrayed, arrested, and in prison, while awaiting trial. I feel a kind of vigil is missing, where one "re-lives" that process together with Jesus, in prayer. I wonder whether there was, or there still is, somewhere, a traditional vigil celebration to "accompany" the Lord during the night. The closest I could find is the Seven Church Visitation , which seems to be ancient, although not very widespread. Still, nothing like a kind of "vigil".

After checking the Orthodox Christianity and Easter tags (over 400 of them), I could find nothing specific on how Orthodox Christianity celebrates Easter Sunday, apart from the Paschal greeting https://christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/62953/what-is-the-earliest-surviving-reference-to-the-paschal-greeting , and one custom of the breaking of pottery on a few of the Greek Ionian islands. In Corfu it happens on Holy Saturday where ceramic pots are thrown off balconies into the streets. In Zakynthos it takes place at the Great Friday evening of ‘The Epitafios Lamentation’ service. This custom is meant to symbolize the Harrowing of Hades or, more specifically, the smashing of the Gates of Hades. I also note a photo in my Enclyclopedia of World Religions of many ostrich eggs being suspended from the ceilings of Armenian churches to serve as symbols of hope and resurrection. *But I do NOT wish to know more about such events.* None of that addresses the actual day called ‘Easter Sunday’ (apart from the Paschal greeting, which I suppose only takes up about 10 seconds of the start of the Easter service.) I wish to know **what customs and acts of worship and celebration the various Orthodox groups engage in on that one day**. I know there are lots of events in Holy Week leading up to the climax of resurrection Sunday, but I do not wish to know about the days prior to then. Stack Exchange is full of information about that. Nor do I wish to know anything about the date for Easter and controversies / theologies about that. Again, the site is full of such information. I only want **information from Orthodox Christians on what happens on that one day – the Sunday (of Holy Week) – and that could come from any of the groups within Orthodoxy** as they all seem to have unique rituals and customs (Nestorian, Monophysite, West Syrian, Armenian, Coptic and Ethiopian). I know the Paschal greeting starts that Easter Sunday service, but what happens thereafter?

Who is this pope's auxiliary? I see him with the Pope in many pictures. Thanks

Did Jesus Christ promise to St. Faustina that if people make a good confession and receive Holy Communion at mass on the second Sunday of Easter they will have a fresh (forgiveness of sins and the remission of all temporal punishment due to sin) start all over again? Or if I am wrong what was that promise that Jesus made to St. Faustina about this?