I heard that Divine Mercy Sunday begins at 6PM on Saturday night. Has anyone else heard that? Any truth to this?According to the Catholic Encyclopedia entry for Sunday, the Jewish method of reckoning days from sunset to sunset hasn't been followed since the Middle Ages:
The method of reckoning the Sunday from sunset to sunset continued in some places down to the seventeenth century, but in general since the Middle Ages the reckoning from midnight to midnight has been followed.According to the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of New York, both traditions of reckoning the liturgical day are ancient:
The method by which the beginning of the day is reckoned appears to have had a significant impact on the formation of the observances of Great Week. Two such methods co-exist in the liturgical tradition of the Orthodox Church. One is of Judaic origin, while the other is Roman-Byzantine. According to the former, the day is reckoned from one sunset to the next. According to the latter, the day begins at midnight. It could be argued that the Roman-Byzantine method, which was incorporated into the laws of the Empire, became the dominant of the two methods. Accordingly, evening observances that once began the liturgical day (according to the Judaic practice), were seen more and more as celebrations of anticipation rather than part of the feast itself. As such, the evening observances of the great feasts acquired the characteristics of a vigil. In the Constantinopolitan tradition these vesperal services were called aapa4ovA - paramone. The paramone consisted of solemn vespers with Scripture lessons. Sometimes, as in the case of Pascha, Christmas and Theophany, the paramone concluded with a Eucharist. Once the evening celebrations were no longer considered as the beginning of a particular festival, it became easier to dislodge them from their original setting.Given that I haven't found any canonical authority defining the beginning of the liturgical day, I'm partial to Pyro7480's terminology in post #311: the period between sunset and midnight is a cusp, so that Pope John Paul II can properly be said to have gone to his reward at the end of the First Saturday by the modern method of reckoning and at the beginning of Divine Mercy Sunday by the ancient method of reckoning.
Having said that, I am confident that his feast day will be celebrated on April 2, not April 3.
How can one go to a vigil Mass on Saturday and have it count as their Sunday obligation if Sunday hasn't begun at sunset?
First, disregard what I said about the time in post #705: I got my times mixed up.
His date of death--or heavenly birthday--will be accounted as April 2, 2005, the Saturday, since that's what it was, after all. (We'll see--sooner than later is my guess--what date he will have for a feast day. April 2, it turns out, is already the feast of St. Francis of Paola, though one source gives it as optional, I think, and I'm sure that the saints don't really carp about not getting the "exact dates.")
Cardinal McCarrick mentioned "Saturday" in his homily concerning the Easter Vigil; after all, the Easter Vigil most likely begins on the prior Saturday evening. If Easter (and other high feasts, BTW, like Christmas) gets the dignity of a vigil, then it's not hard to see why Sunday, the "little Easter," may get the same. (IIRC, concerning the Catholic Encyclopedia mention: Saturday evening Vigil masses didn't begin until somewhat recently, after the writing of that Catholic Encyclopedia, which is from nearly a hundred years ago. There used to be stricter limits on the time of day when masses were permitted.)
As others have already written, Saturday evening masses can fulfill the Sunday obligation. As I also wrote in #705, the first reading at the Mass now being celebrated at St. Matthew's Cathedral in Washington was for the Sunday, the homily was for the Sunday, and it's still early Saturday evening. This was around 6 pm in Washington, and the Pope died after 9 pm in Rome.