www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Catholic Lent and Calendars

Dear djs,

As long as you follow the Administrator's advice, then we're ALL happy!

Alex

I agree with you, Alex (not that you care :p ).

djs,

Perhaps you can clarify something for me. Exactly where is it in a council or tradition that says that the date is to be calculated by Rome?

Your first argument I am willing to let alone: that is that Rome should not be condemned for violating the First Council of Nicea because it is calculating the equinox more accurately, etc.

You also argued that it shouldn't be used to cause schisms within the church.

You've gone one step further, now.

If my church is guilty of misunderstanding what was said at Nicea, but not condemning or causing schisms within the Body of Christ over it, I'm pretty sure we're on safe ground and we're not "flouting" anything.

If I were a rabid old-calendarist I would probably have a dry, legalistic response for your dry, legalistic condemnation.

As it is, I think you're being as great an extrmist as any from ROCIE.

Aren't there Old-Calendar Catholic jurisdictions? Gosh, how do you commune with them if their calendar is heretical?

Can I throw some fuel on the fire?

One of the issues not discussed is the fact that at the time of the Nicean Council the Jews did not have a unified method of calculating Passover. The National Council of Churches has an interesting article on its website about this:

Excerpt: � By the end of the 2nd century some churches celebrated Easter/Pascha on the day of the Jewish passover, regardless of the day of the week, while others celebrated it on the following Sunday. By the 4th century, the former practice had been abandoned practically universally, but differences still remained in the calculation of the date of Easter/Pascha. The ecumenical council held at Nicea in 325 AD determined that Easter/Pascha should be celebrated on the Sunday following the first vernal full moon. Originally passover was celebrated on the first full moon after the March equinox, but in the 3rd century the day of the feast came to be calculated by some Jewish communities without reference to the equinox, thus causing passover to be celebrated twice in some solar years. Nicea tried to avoid this by linking the principles for the dating of Easter/Pascha to the norms for the calculation of passover during Jesus' lifetime.�
[ Link to article ] [wcc-coe.org]

It is my personal feeling that Pope Gregory was correct in his desire to fix an astronomical issue and his plan was a good one, but that he was incorrect in not finding a way to accomplish the goal across all the Christian Churches.

I will never have the time to research it, but I would really like to see the original Greek text from Nicea regarding Passover, together with a very literal English translation. Several people more knowledgeable on this topic than I have indicated that 1) the directives regarding the date of Pascha are not mandated and start off with the equivalent of �It seems best�� and 2) the reference to Passover was not actually to celebrate after the Jewish Passover but �irregardless� of the date of the Jewish Passover. Given that the Jews of that era changed their method of calculating the date of Passover and that there was more than one way of calculating Passover being used, how did Nicea address these issues (either directly or as it was implemented)?

The article notes the intent of Nicea � a desire for unity. That is important.

As a practical matter, I like the Aleppo recommendations. The Jews now have a united method of calculating Passover so the problem of different methods of calculating Passover goes away. If there is still a difference in opinion over whether the Nicean fathers meant �irregardless of the date of Passover� or �after the Jewish Passover� then for the sake of unity go with the Easterners who insist it was �after�. That would mean taking the current Eastern method of calculating Pascha and using a scientifically accurate astronomical date of the vernal equinox in Jerusalem.

That's the big problem. No record of the agreements on these matters at Nicea exist. The closest dcument is the letter of the Emperor that I linked to earlier in the thread.

Dear Cizinec:

Actually, there was some sense that the official astronomical reclkoning was to be done in Alexandria, which had the best astronomers. IIRC there is a comment on this point at the website of the Alexandrian Church (Coptic). What we know from history (see e.g., CCEL site) is that Rome continued to do its own astronomy at that time (and was off by three days), immediately after Nicea. And that Rome's doing so was not a cause for breaking communion.

You are of course exactly right; I assume this posture a a little tongue-in-cheek. But it is for a little balance to the criticisms of old-calendarists. And as I pointed out, the canonical Orthodox Bishops of North America have gone on record stating that the Western calculation is faithful to the Nicean agreement. The corrolary to their position is obvious.

Heretical? Uncanonical is even too far. But it's always a good question ... how is it that we have communion here and not there? Once we objectively figure that out, no telling where it might lead!

Picking up Srbian?

Thanks for that clarification. That explains why the texts of the Ecumenical Councils I have don't mention the issue.

Yes. In doing so I've decid'd to gt rd of superfluous vowels. Actually, I've been using a Dvorak keyboard for about two years now and have noticed that it's very easy to miss the "e" when typing.

In the end, it seems that the issue is one of unity. That's what the Church Fathers were addressing at Nicea.

The problem I have with the Roman model is that is seems to too easily make unilateral changes.

My problem with some forms of uncanonical (and even some canonical) Orthodox groups is their lack of desire for unity, which they deride as the "ecumenism heresy."

That may be a different topic altogether, but I think these are the two extreme forces at work within this entire controversy.

I think the Church Fathers were facing similar forces at Nicea and they worked out the issue properly. Within Orthodoxy, I think a solution will be reached this century and I think it will be in the spirit of Nicea.

Between Rome and Orthodoxy, well, that involves more and I doubt the calendar issue will make a difference. It all boils down to ecclesiology and we "Easterners" like our ecclesiology like our slivovice: 180 proof.

Dear Cizinec,

I DO care and agree fully with your post above!

It matters to the Orthodox East not a wit what Judaism currently does, or what the astronomers have said or are saying (and least of all, what the Pope of Rome thinks of the matter ).

The calendar issue is definitely NOT one of who can prove they are more scientifically correct or not.

You are absolutely correct.

Alex