wfn.org | Churches to End 400-year Confusion

[PCUSA.NEWS@pcusa.org]

2-April-1997 
97143 
 
      Churches Invited to End 400-year Confusion Over Easter 
 
                         by Edmund Doogue 
                  Ecumenical News International 
 
GENEVA--Churches around the world will be asked to cooperate in an 
international effort to put an end, from the year 2001, to the 400-year-old 
split over the date of the most important celebration in the Christian 
calendar, Easter. 
 
     At present, Easter -- the festival marking the resurrection of Jesus 
Christ from the dead -- is usually celebrated on two different dates. This 
year, for example, most Protestants and Roman Catholics celebrated Easter 
on March 30, while most Orthodox, along with some Protestants and 
Catholics, will hold their Easter services almost a month later, on April 
27. The different dates are the result of disagreement over reform of the 
calendar by Pope Gregory XIII 400 years ago. 
 
     At a March 5-10 meeting held in Aleppo, Syria, sponsored by the World 
Council of Churches (WCC) and the Middle East Council of Churches (MECC), 
representatives of the world's main Christian traditions agreed on what the 
World Council of Churches described as "an ingenious proposal to set a 
common date for Easter." 
 
     According to the proposal, churches would continue to follow the 
current formula to calculate the date of Easter, but with the assistance of 
the most accurate astronomical scientific knowledge available. This would 
overcome the previous division, under which both traditions insisted upon 
retaining their old methods for calculating the date, even though they are 
not always completely faithful to the formula laid down by the early 
church. 
 
     The Rev. Dr. Thomas Fitzgerald, a theologian and senior WCC official 
who took part in the Aleppo meeting, told ENI that among Christians the 
division over Easter was "an internal scandal.  And we have to ask what 
sort of witness this division gives to the world at large," he said. 
 
     "We're talking about the resurrection of Christ, a sign of our unity 
and reconciliation," said Fitzgerald, who is also a priest of the Greek 
Orthodox Archdiocese of America, a province of the Ecumenical Patriarchate 
of Constantinople. "There is no greater feast than Easter, and yet when you 
look at how we celebrate it, we do so in a divided way." 
 
     In church circles over the past few years there has been strong 
pressure for churches to reach an agreement on the Easter date by the end 
of the century. The year 2001 has long been seen as an ideal year to 
inaugurate an agreed set of dates, because in that year April 15 happens to 
be the date according to both present systems of calculation.  
 
     A proposal from the Aleppo meeting will be sent to churches around the 
world, along with a chart showing possible dates for Easter in the first 25 
years of the 21st century, to be adopted if the proposal is accepted.  
 
     Fitzgerald told ENI that while he was "neither optimistic nor 
pessimistic" about the likelihood of the proposal being accepted in time 
for 2001, there was great significance attached to the Easter date, and he 
hoped there could be agreement. 
 
     The differences over the Easter date "resulted chiefly from the fact 
that the four Gospels did not provide the actual date of the Resurrection, 
but only said that it occurred in relationship to Passover and on the first 
day of the week," Fitzgerald said. 
 
     In the first centuries of the Christian era, there was disagreement 
over the date of Easter, but the problem was resolved at the First 
Ecumenical Council in Nicaea in A.D. 325, which produced an acceptable 
formula, according to which Easter was celebrated on the first Sunday 
following the first full moon after the spring equinox. This formula helped 
maintain the link between the scriptural record and the yearly celebration 
of Easter. 
 
     According to Fitzgerald, "the Easter controversy in the early church 
ultimately led to an important consensus which was expressed at the Council 
of Nicaea. There was a profound recognition that the celebration of the 
Resurrection should not be a sign of division among Christians." 
 
     However, the consensus over Easter was broken when Pope Gregory XIII 
reformed the calendar in 1582, thus changing the dates for Easter. Most 
Orthodox churches did not alter the method for calculating Easter. 
 
     Even now there are inaccuracies in both methods for calculating the 
date of Easter. But while there were differences in the methods, there was, 
as at the Council of Nicaea, basic agreement regarding the formula. The 
solution proposed at Aleppo -- using the most scientifically accurate 
methods available to calculate the dates of Easter -- would be based on the 
Nicaea formula. 
 
     Much of the impetus for fixing a common date for Easter has come from 
the Middle East, where Christians from different traditions live in close 
proximity, though very much as small Christian minorities. In some parts of 
the Middle East local churches have between them reached agreement on 
common dates for Easter. 
 
     Fitzgerald told ENI that a common date would be of special importance 
in regions where there was a high level of intermarriage between Christians 
from different traditions. He said that in his own home parish in 
Manchester, New Hampshire, the Easter date was important as families with 
members in different Christian traditions had to choose which date to 
follow. 
 
     Fitzgerald said some churches had resisted pressure that had come at 
various times from big business, educational institutions and governments 
to hold Easter on the same date every year. 
 
     "The churches want to remain in harmony with Nicaea," Fitzgerald said. 
"The Resurrection is a divine event that breaks into reality, and maybe 
that variation [of the date celebrated each year] helps us to think about 
that." 
 
     Fitzgerald is the executive director of the Programme for Unity and 
Renewal at the World Council of Churches.  The organizations represented at 
the Aleppo meeting were the Anglican Communion, Armenian Orthodox Church, 
Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, Evangelical Churches in the 
Middle East, Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch, Lutheran World 
Federation, Middle East Council of Churches, Old-Catholic Churches of the 
Union of Utrecht, Patriarchate of Moscow, the Vatican's Pontifical Council 
for Promoting Christian Unity, the Seventh-day Adventists and the World 
Council of Churches. 
 
          The Aleppo gathering was hosted by the Syrian Orthodox Church. 

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