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I have no objection to those who celebrate according to the ancient Paschalion. My sister and daughter both attend Churches that are on the Julian Calendar for Pascha. I merely look for some cogent, coherent and vaguely rational reason for so doing that doesn't come across as obscurantism for its own sake.

Well, to be technical, the Julian Calendar wasn't the only one used in the Roman Empire. A number of cities had their own calendars, and in particular the numbering of years differed significantly, making synchronization difficult. Rome used eponymous years based on who were the Consuls (and sometimes, the regnal year of the Emperor); Romans also dated years from the founding of the City. Greeks like to date things by the Olympiad; Eastern cities and principalities dated from the year of the ruling king, and so forth. The numbering scheme of Diyonysius Exiguus took a long time to gain general acceptance, which makes dating events a real chore for historians.

Which is exactly why I emphasized the fact of continuous usage and unbroken tradition--these do carry a lot more weight for the Eastern mindset than for the Western, while cold scientific accuracy carries significantly less weight.

This is about the only argument available that qualifies as "vaguely rational."

The other arguments I have heard are:

• The Council of Nicaea mandated that Pascha must never coincide with the Jewish Passover celebration
• The Julian Calendar/Paschalion really is more accurate
• (my favorite) The Fathers of Nicaea knew that it would be impossible to produce a Paschalion that would be 100% accurate astronomically, so they opted instead for one that would be spiritually accurate for all time

Needless to say, none of these qualify as vaguely rational.

This is a problem that will only be resolved when, with God's help, we resolve the real problem, which is the schism.


Peace,
Deacon Richard

Now wait a minute!

What's wrong with obscurantism [what a lovely word, and the spellchecker even recognizes it! {though it doesn't recognize"spellchecker" itself . . .|}]?

hawk, a fan of obscurantism in this Year of Our Lord MMIX

dochawk:

obscurum per obscurius

Could someone proof me that these decisions were part of the canon of Nicaea.
Actually none of the 20 canons of Nicaea voted in the council are about this issue (link [legionofmarytidewater.com])
We have only a letter to the Egyptian (which is not a canon), that simply says: "We also send you the good news of the settlement concerning the holy Pasch, namely that in answer to your prayers this question also has been resolved. All the brethren in the East who have hitherto followed the Jewish practice will henceforth observe the custom of the Romans and of yourselves and of all of us who from ancient times have kept Easter together with you." (a text anyway found only in the Greek version and not in the Latin version and so not binding for the West as an ecumenical decision)

Nowhere Nicaea says something like: The Fathers opted instead for one that would be [i]spiritually accurate[/i],
Nowhere a detailed Paschalion was chosen to be followed.
Nowhere Nicaea mandated that Pascha must never coincide with the Jewish Passover celebration (we can argue from above that Christians shall simply not consider the Jewish way to computate Pascha. Actually for the West this simply means that if the first moon of spring is on Sunday, such Sunday is not considered as the first Sunday after the new moon)

The Easter Paschalion was not accurate (it uses a 19 years cycle not a 81 years cycle as the Western one): every year it accumulated small error: it could be used in a range of 200 years, but later it became more and more "random".

The Easter Paschalion was not faxed from the heavens nor issued by Nicaea!
And when after 2000 years we add to the errors due to the un-accuracy of the Easter Paschalion the errors due to the wrong set of spring due to the un-accuracy of the Julian Calendar, we have that now the Orthodox Pascha is absolutely random away from the first Sunday after the spring equinox

They were not in the Canons. That Nicaea gave no extant Canons on this topic is discussed and agreed by all in the links I provided (see prior post this thread ) to the previous threads on this (the calendars) topic. A prescription is attributed to Nicaea by other (reasonably close) sources and neither East nor West at the present disputes the prescription that Pascha is celebrated on the Sunday after the first full moon (which is actually for both calendars an ecclesial full moon, an acceptable approximation used in the two paschalion's tables) after the northern hemisphere's vernal equinox (nominally March 21). That is a common starting point, and references to Nicaea should be understood as above, not to actual Canons.

Nicaea also wanted no reliance on any calculations of the Jewish Passover. That got completely turned around, ironically, by the most vocal advocates who insist on adherence to Nicaea; it apparently fit in nicely with the accumulating error in the Julian calendar/paschalion to reverse the requirement and thus, conveniently, it becomes a form of self-justification. That Pascha follow Passover seems to make sense to many who are unaware, ignore or dispute the actual stipulation. And this false requirement is an easy sell to those who are not aware of Nicaea's actual intent. And it is repeated and repeated, and is said to make sense, and repeated and ...

Not issued as Canons but from Nicaea in the sense noted above, and seemingly agreed upon in its formulation but disputed in its application (Julian vs. Gregorian etc.).

Technically I'd say not random in that it follows a rule. The sense of appearing random is there, and is confirmed by the data and conclusion of the Aleppo study.

antv,

Forgive me for not making my post clearer.

I meant to say that these commonly-given justifications for the JC/JP hold no water whatsoever, and when I called one of them "my favorite," it was because I admire the creativity behind it--nothing more.


Peace,
Deacon Richard

Nelson,

What of the mandate from I Nicaea that all Christians should celebrate Pascha on the same day?

I agree that we should celebrate on one calendar. Currently, since the Church is divided we find ourselves with a situation that doesn't allow us to do that. The Fathers call us to celebrate together and that should be our goal. First, I believe, we should fix the divisions and then we should address the calendar issue. Second, we should work out our salvation on the calendar we presently find ourselves in until that time that the whole Church reunited can come a definite conclusion on the issues. Trying to prove which one is scientifically correct just keeps us divided.

To simplify matters, every Eastern Catholic Church should be on the same calendar as its Orthodox counterpart (though this would prevent me from celebrating Pascha twice in most years, which I enjoy). This would coordinate one half of the Church, and then the only thing to do would be resolution concurrent with the reconciliation of the Eastern Churches with the Latin Church.

The only thing with that is what if the Orthodox counterpart used the Revised Julian Calendar or the Julian Calendar? So all Eastern Catholics and Orthodox would celebrate Pascha together (except for the Church of Finland which is on the full Gregorian usage) the other major Feasts of Our Lord and the Theotokos not to mention Saints would be different. So we would still be divided from the Western Church and other Eastern Churches for other feasts.

I think that the Calendar issue is one that needs to be resolved but it needs to be solved by both the Eastern and Western Church reunited, so we can be faithful to Council of Nicaea I and every Christian celebrates the Lords resurrection together. Until that day I believe we should worship on the Calendar used by the particular Church that God has called us to struggle in and pray for the day when we can celebrate Pascha together reunited on a single calendar.

Easier to get to a final resolution if the differences between the Eastern Catholics and their non-Catholic counterparts are minimized first. Outside of the United States, almost all Greek Catholics use the Julian Paschalion. Here, we use the Gregorian Paschalion (with a few exceptions), because the Latin bishops would not have it any other way, and our bishops are always willing to bend over backwards to accommodate their Latin proteges.

The Malankara Orthodox and Catholics all use the Gregorian Calendar, while the Syriac Orthodox in India use the Gregorian and the Syriac Orthodox in the MidEast use the Julian.

StuartK,

I don't know if it's "bending over backwards" in this instance, or an accommodation made by the Eastern prelates because this is a Latin majority, in the West and unity in this region should be within the Gregorian Calendar.

The changeover in calendar for the Greek Catholics in America was a late development--some time around World War II, as I believe. It was not well received in a lot of places. It also created a division within particular Churches of the same rite, which to me seems more important than fitting in with the Latins.