Fixed Easter

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30286, 12 November 1963, Page 12

Fixed Easter

The overwhelming vote of the Vatican Council in favour of a fixed Easter brings calendar reform into the field of practical politics. That will disturb traditionalists but please statisticians, economists, and commerce generally, because of the problems they encounter when Easter moves from one quarter to another and from one financial year to another. Some financial years include no Easter; some have two. The change will be regretted by those who find in the movable nature of the feast a reminder of what it signifies and a link with the ancient church, going back more than 3000 years to the time of Moses and the Passover in the Land of Goshen. But, in fact, the Christian Church from earliest times has been uncertain on occasions when Easter should be kept. When the Gregorian Calendar was devised in 1582 a fixed Easter was proposed, but not adopted. The question was again of international interest in 1926, wnen the League of Nations proposed a fixed Easter, but encountered strong religious opposition. The British Parliament in

1928 went so far as to pass an act providing for a fixed Easter, to be introduced by Order-in-Council, an order that has never been issued. A fixed Easter would be of advantage to the church as well as to commerce in fixing its own calendar, the movable feasts in which are largely calculated with reference to Easter. The effect on the secular calendar would, however, be more remarkable, an evening up of the quarters and months of the year, and the occurrence of the same day of the month on the same day of the week every year. If this were only tidiness for the sake of tidiness it would be repellent; but a more orderly arrangement of the calendar, within the limits set by the quite disorderly length of the solar year, would be convenient for so many people that it is certain eventually to be adopted. Those who enjoy the unexpectedness of present arrangements and would dislike having their birthday, for instance, always fall on a Monday will, however, join those who value the symbolism of the Gregorian Calendar in resenting its utilitarian amendment.