In Eastern and Oriental Orthodox Churches, Pascha (PAHSS-ka), also called Easter, is the feast of the Resurrection of the Lord. It is the fundamental and most important festival on their calendars – every other religious celebration, including Christmas, is of secondary importance. This is easily seen in the rich Paschal traditions found in countries that have traditionally had Orthodox Christian majorities.
Note: Believing that the word Easter has roots in early pagan rites at the spring equinox, some Orthodox Christians discourage the use of the term. However, most in English speaking countries are unaware of the history and evolution of the word Easter and so use it without any sense of pagan undertones. Many English speaking Orthodox Christians use the term Easter.
Celebrated this year on April 19th, Pascha usually is either one or five weeks after the observance of Easter by Western Christians. (Just to keep those of us who are interested in such things on our toes, sometimes the two observances fall on the same day . . . and once in a while they are four weeks apart!) Though both Eastern Christians and Western Christians use the same basic formula to determine the date of Pascha/Easter, they use different calendars – and therefore different starting points, in their computations. Eastern Christians use the older Julian calendar - its solar calendar is 13 days behind that of the Gregorian calendar (used by Western Christians). Additionally, the Julian lunar calendar is four to five days behind the Gregorian.
As mentioned previously, Jesus’ resurrection from the dead is the center of the Orthodox Christian faith. The feast of Pascha is preceded by twelve weeks of preparation. Included are pre-lenten Sundays, Great Lent, and Holy Week. The Orthodox Christian faithful strive to journey through these twelve weeks with repentance, forgiveness, reconciliation, prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and study. When the feast finally arrives, it is celebrated with the combining of a collection of services into one.
Traditional Greeting: Starting with the feast of Pascha and lasting until Ascension (a period known as Paschaltide or Pentecostarion) the Paschal greeting is used during ceremonial services, and informally at other times, among Orthodox Christians. Its form is that of greeting and response: In place of "hello", or a similar greeting, one person greets another with: "Christ is Risen!" The response then is: "Truly, He is risen!" or "Indeed, He is risen!" (In practice, the Paschal greeting is typically limited to use with people who are already known to be Orthodox.)
Though estimates of the size of the Eastern Orthodox Church are varied, there is a general consensus that there are a total of around 225,000,000 adherents – making the Eastern Orthodox Church the world’s third largest religious body. (Note: The autonomous national churches which make up the Eastern Orthodox ecumenical communion – including the Greek Orthodox Church, Russian Orthodox Church, Orthodox Church of America, Bulgarian Orthodox Church, and others - all recognize each other as being part of the same Church, whose current practical and pastoral center is the Patriarchate at Constantinople.)
During this most special time of Pascha, we suggest that we each pause for a few moments and, in manners appropriate in our individual faith traditions and/or belief systems, send thoughts of love and good will to all of our Orthodox Christian brothers and sisters.
Shalom Salaam Peace
Kay & Dave Corby, Founders Common Tables In addition to the United States, Common Tables has members in six other countries.
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