WCC NEWS: Common Easter date: Christians to continue working

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World Council of Churches - News

CHRISTIANS AND CHURCHES ENCOURAGED TO CONTINUE WORKING ON COMMON DATE FOR
EASTER

For immediate release: 14 April 2011

The general secretary of the World Council of Churches, the Rev. Dr Olav
Fykse Tveit, has urged Christians to give this year’s celebration of
Easter a clear ecumenical profile and to work for a common date of Easter
for the future, noting that this year it falls on the same day 24 April
for both eastern and western traditions.

"In a world divided by poverty and violence, it is important that we are
one in our witness to the crucified and risen Christ in actions as well as
in words," said Tveit."We rejoice that this year Christians of eastern and
western traditions will celebrate the resurrection of the Lord on the same
date."

Because the date of Easter is calculated using either the Julian calendar
used by most Orthodox churches, or the Gregorian calendar, Christians of
eastern and western traditions often celebrate Easter on different
Sundays.

There have been five times in the past 10 years when Easter has fallen on
the same date for all Christians. In the future this will be less frequent
with the next coinciding dates being in 2017 and 2025.

Significant work was undertaken in the 1980s on agreeing a common date at
the Pan-Orthodox level, but implementation was difficult at the time
because many churches concerned were living under communist regimes. This
work was taken up at a consultation in 1997 in Aleppo, Syria, sponsored
jointly by the WCC and the Middle East Council of Churches, which proposed
a way of calculating the date of Easter so that it would always be
celebrated on the same day.

"I hope that in the decade ahead, Christians from different traditions will
work together in trust and mutual accountability to come to agreement
about a common date for Easter, on the basis of the process laid out in
the Aleppo document," said Tveit.

This week the WCC general secretary reiterated a call he made during
January’s Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, for Christians to consider
inviting one another to simple meals in the 50 days following the
celebration of Christ rising from the dead.

"Such meals could be a powerful way of celebrating God's love and how we
are "one" - offering each other a foretaste of God's kingdom of justice
and joy," said Tveit. “It is one way that we can give ecumenical profile
to our celebration of the risen Lord.”

"Maybe these meals could even be for the whole community where we live?
Around the table we get to know one another differently, we talk, we
learn, we laugh, we are in fellowship … and we break bread together."

Frequently asked questions about the date of Easter (Link:
http://www.oikoumene.org/index.php?RDCT=282be1a7ce1cbadbf637 )

The Aleppo document (Link:
http://www.oikoumene.org/index.php?RDCT=5f5c4aed32140e02de58 )


The World Council of Churches promotes Christian unity in faith, witness 
and service for a just and peaceful world. An ecumenical fellowship of 
churches founded in 1948, today the WCC brings together 349 Protestant, 
Orthodox, Anglican and other churches representing more than 560 million 
Christians in over 110 countries, and works cooperatively with the Roman 
Catholic Church. The WCC general secretary is Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, 
from the [Lutheran] Church of Norway. Headquarters: Geneva, Switzerland.



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