This year, Easter falls on April 20th, which is a little later than usual, but that’s because Easter falls on the Sunday after the first full moon, which is on April 12th-13th. The next Sunday that follows is April 20th, which is why Easter is so late this year.
A rare alignment in the Gregorian and the Julian Calendars makes it so that Catholics and Orthodox Christians will be celebrating Easter on the same day this year. Usually, since they use different calendars, they do not celebrate Easter on the same day, which results in roughly a 13-day difference in their Easter. The Orthodox Church uses the Julian Calendar, which is 13 days behind the Gregorian Calendar.
Easter commemorates the resurrection of Jesus Christ and is calculated by the Spring equinox and the first full moon following after. The Bible, specifically the New Testament, describes the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ on the third day, which is now celebrated as Easter Sunday. The Jewish festival of Passover and Easter are linked because of the timing of when Jesus was crucified.
Easter customs have varied and changed over the years while incorporating religious and secular traditions. For example, the tradition of Easter eggs has been around for many years. The idea stems from eggs symbolizing birth and fertility in a lot of pagan traditions. Christians started adopting the decoration of Easter eggs as a tradition to represent the empty tomb and new life. However, the Easter bunny was most likely started by German immigrants who moved to America because they brought their stories about a hare that lays eggs. Another tradition people tend to do with the eggs after decorating them is to do Easter egg hunts for young children. Sometimes, people will use plastic eggs and put candy inside of them so the kids can have a reward for finding them.
The earliest celebration of Easter that was recorded was from the second century, even though the commemoration of Jesus’s resurrection was most likely earlier than the celebration.
We still do not know the origin of the word Easter came from, but it’s parallel to the German word “Ostern,” further showing how German immigrants brought their traditions over to America when they immigrated over. There are many speculations about where it originated. One speculation, in particular, is from the eighth century, which says it’s derived from Eostre or Eostrae, which is an Anglo-Saxon goddess that might have been in correlation to spring and fertility.
There was some controversy about the date of Easter in the early days of Christianity, which was not resolved until around the eighth century when they decided to make it based on the day the Jews celebrated their Passover Crossing. The Passover Crossing is on the 14th day of Spring’s first full moon, usually making the day of Easter fall on a date closer to the middle of April.
In the West, the Resurrection of Christ was celebrated on Sunday, the first day of the week, after Jesus had risen from the dead. So, easter was then celebrated on the first Sunday after the 14th day of the month of Nisan.
There have been several chances to make a fixed date for Easter, but there still is not one.
