[Church of England] Bishop Leads Backlash Against Fixed Date for Easter

Arguments over Easter date could make rows over same-sex marriage look easy, warns Bishop of Salisbury

A prominent Church of England bishop has spoken out against plans by the world's main Christian denominations to fix the date of Easter to the same Sunday every year.

Anglican primates agreed earlier this year to join discussions involving Coptic Orthodox and Roman Catholic leaders to set a common date for the festival for the first time.

Such a move would not only simplify economic planning but unite different traditions around the world and end almost 2,000 years of theological controversy.

However the Bishop of Salisbury, the Rt Rev Nicholas Holtam, warned that the move would detach Christianity from its Jewish roots by breaking the link between the timing of Easter and Passover.

According to the New Testament, Jesus was crucified during the Passover festival and the Last Supper, commemorated in the Christian Communion service, is widely thought to have been a Passover meal.

Another long term crisis started, once again,
by the all-knowing and science hating Church.

Think how less complicated it would have been
to stay on the lunar calendar.

Same number of days, same time for the feasts
each year, no poems to remember which month
had how many days, but, no, the Church couldn’t
do that, could they?

We don't need a fixed date, we need a common date.

I have found much of the reporting confuses these two issues.

Such a move would not only simplify economic planning but unite different traditions around the world and end almost 2,000 years of theological controversy.

Simplifying economic planning is not a legitimate reason to fix the date of Easter. I would prefer another 2000 years of theological controversy to fixing the date of Easter.

But non unity among Christians is even a greater scandel, which includes the issue of not having a certain date for Easter. Case in point, the Catholics and Protestants observe Easter TODAY and then the Orthodox do theirs on May 1st. In truth the later is closer to the Jewish Passover than ours this year. Next year all the churches come together for Easter, which is very good.

Yeah. The science-hating Church based the Gregorian Calendar on astronomical calculation so accurate that it accounts for solar lunar and axis-tilt factors to keep seasonal events within their correct seasons without major adjustments over a period of centuries.

But by all means keep your own calendar. It’ll be so fun for you.

I’m not sure where the idea of a fixed date got any currency. It’s an absolute non-starter for the Orthodox, since it violates decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, as is simply adopting the Gregorian Paschalion, in view of multiple local councils anathematizing it.

The one bit of wiggle room on this would be if the Russians, Georgians, Serbs and Jerusalem could be persuaded to drop the Julian calendar (which is a matter of long-established custom, rather than something based on conciliar decrees). In that case a proposal floated by the Copts a while back could be the basis for a common date: follow the ancient prescription, but using the most astronomically accurate available calendar — now the civil calendar complete with “leap seconds” — rather than either the Julian or Gregorian calendar as the basis for calculating the vernal equinox.

The really objectionable thing in Pope Gregory’s reform was not the improvement in astronomical accuracy, but using the first Sunday after first full moon after the vernal equinox as the Feast of the Resurrection, rather than computing Passover — which lasts seven days — as starting with the first full moon after the vernal equinox, then having Pascha as the first Sunday after the completion of Passover (to abide by the conciliar prohibition on celebrating with or before the Jews).

Had the Coptic proposal been adopted when it was first made, today would have been Palm Sunday for everyone, and Pascha would have been kept next Sunday.

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