Once again the time is upon us for micro-waving Peeps and watching very small children in cute clothes bumble about with small baskets lined with plastic grass. One of the few holidays that does not have a fixed date, Easter is a moveable egg hunt with the roots of its strange flexibility in the distant past. There is even a vestige of the Hebrew calendar in the mix. Christmas and Halloween, while both pagan holidays co-opted by The Church, are firmly fixed on the calendar regardless of the day of the week they fall on. Not Easter. Easter can fall on any Sunday between March 22nd and April 25th. Why?
Before the First Council of Nicaea, convened by the Emperor Constantine in 325 CA, the Christians were in disarray when it came to what day Easter actually fell on. Originally the day of Easter was based on the Hebrew calendar because the scriptures say that Christ was crucified on the day after Passover. The last supper was held on a Holy Thursday. Passover is based on the Hebrew calendar which is a lunar system. Given the difference between the Hebrew, Julian and Gregorian Calendar systems, its no wonder that early Christians were celebrating Easter almost willy-nilly.
In June of the year 325, the 300 odd leaders of The Church got together in Nicaea in what is now Turkey. There were a lot of agenda items do deal with, including formulating the Nicaean Creed, the issue of self-castration versus castration by barbarians, keeping only women who are above suspicion and of course anathematizing Arius and his pesky blasphemous teachings and followers. Also on the to-do list was establishing a system for determining the day of the Easter feast.
So, here is how it works. In a nod to the Jewish lunar calendar, Easter falls on the Sunday after the Paschal Full Moon. Simple, no? The Paschal full moon is the first full moon after the Spring Equinox in the Northern Hemisphere. The equinox falls on either March 21st or 22nd depending on the mood the sun is in that year. So now, blending the lunar and solar calendars, you simply find the next full moon after the equinox and then the following Sunday is Easter. Voila'!
Well, not quite. While the system adopted by the Fathers served fairly well for the Western Church, what we now call the Roman Catholic Church, it is different in the Eastern or Orthodox Church. The churches split off one from another in the Great Schism of 1054. But that's a whole 'nother blog.
Because the Orthodox Church uses the Julian Calendar (not to be confused with julienne fries) and the Roman Catholic Church uses the Gregorian Calendar, the dates for Easter got all muddled again. So, for anyone reading this who is from the Orthodox side of the Christian line, the system as described above does not work and you will just have to look it up. For anyone on the Western side of the great schism, you will find that this year is remarkable in that it is the penultimate date that is possible on the late end of the Easter spectrum. April 24th it is. Enjoy, because Easter will not fall on a later date until the year 2038.
I'll be 79 years old on that Easter and perhaps my choices for Peep art will be different. Who's to say?
Since I am not yet quite fully into Geezerhood, I look forward to the Peeps being deformed in the beams of the microwave, even at this late date. Good luck finding those eggs!
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