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Billy Bost, of Tupelo, kisses the Bible during a Pascha service at St. Paul Orthodox Church in Tupelo.
By Riley Manning
Daily Journal
Last weekend, the Orthodox Church around the world celebrated Easter – a full five weeks after the Catholic and Protestant’s marking of the holiday.
Western Christians might call it late, but to Orthodox Christians, it’s right on Biblical time.
“The Western church changed the calculation of Easter in the Middle Ages from the Julian Calendar to the Gregorian Calendar,” said Fr. Philip Rogers, assistant pastor at St. John Orthodox Church in Memphis. “Today, the Julian and the Gregorian calendars are about 13 days different.”
Both the Orthodox and Western churches place Easter on the first Sunday after the first full moon following the vernal equinox. The difference is that the Western church uses a fixed date for the vernal equinox, March 23, while the Orthodox Church uses the astronomical full moon as observed from Jerusalem, the site of the crucifixion and resurrection.
“That way, Orthodox Easter always happens after Passover, which is consistent with the Biblical order of events around Jesus’ death,” Rogers said. “Sometimes they fall on the same Sunday, but other times, like this year, they can be as far as five weeks apart.”
Early controversy
Rogers said one of the first controversies in the first century was when, exactly, to celebrate Easter.
“In fact, it was one of the topics of conversation at the First Council of Nicaea,” Rogers said. “Some wanted a physical date, but the council decreed that Easter would always be on a Sunday, the day of resurrection. Each Sunday is a kind of mini-Easter.”
The passage of time plays a heavy part in the Orthodox Church’s celebration of Easter, or Pascha.
At St. Paul Orthodox Church in Tupelo, services began Thursday evening, April 28, during which a replica of Christ was hung on a cross in the church’s worship space. The following afternoon, the replica was removed and placed in a tomb adorned with flowers, and, were it not for the rain, the tomb would have been processed around the church grounds.
Members of St. Paul broke for a meal before another, more mournful service that same evening, which revolved around the lamentations of Mary.
Last Saturday morning, priests changed their vestments from black to white to acknowledge Jesus’ descent into Hades to conquer death. Saturday night at 10 on into the next day, St. Paul held their final service, commemorating Christ’s resurrection.
“The whole thing only took a few days,” said acting priest at St. Paul, Fr. Don Berge. “That’s how it was in history – that bogus trial in the middle of the night and everything.”
Symbolism
The Orthodox Church’s strict adherance to the practices of the early church, including its insistence on the day it celebrates Easter, may seem like hair-splitting to an outsider. However, maintaining the timeline of Jesus’ death, Berge said, not only gives the worshiper a more complete effect, but is necessary to fully communicate the symbolism of Christ’s death.
“Jesus was crucified at the 9th hour, which is also the time Jews killed lambs to celebrate Passover,” Berge said.
The Passover celebration recalls the story of the 10 plagues Moses used to free the Jews from slavery in Egypt. Found in the book of Exodus, the final plague called down the angel of death on the first-born child of Egyptian families. Jews marked their doors with lamb’s blood so the angel of death would know to pass over their homes.
“Jesus is our Passover lamb,” Rogers said. “On Easter, the angel of death passes over us as well.”
If anything defines the Orthodox faith, Rogers said, it is its fidelity to detail. It strives to be a modern implementation of the first century idea about what the church should be.
“Truth isn’t relative. It doesn’t change. God doesn’t change,” he said. “Christ established the church for us to know God, so we’re reluctant to change anything.”
riley.manning@journalinc.com