My Annual Easer Rant

Now that my complaints about the festive season have faded a little I can now turn my attention to my annual rant about another feast day in the Christian calendar and how the concept of a moveable feast has a detrimental effect on the whole nation regardless of faith.

The news today that Sainsbury’s is to cut jobs and to close their cafes and counters is a blow to all forced to shop in these retail monoliths.? Other retail giants (ogres?) will follow the same path I am sure.? Retail staff are not well paid and often have few other potential ways of earning a living.?? My sympathy is with them.? Supermarkets are not all bad of course but their domination of the food supply chain does not sit well with the concept of the sovereign consumer.

On a much much less important note I was not surprised to see on the Sainsbury website an announcement that EASTER IS COMING.? I doubt that this is an expression of religious fervour, and I note that the headline was accompanied by an advertisement for a new ‘variety’ of ‘Finest’ Hot Cross Buns (at a price rather higher than that mentioned in the nursery rhyme).

Do you know the date of Easter this year or next??

Is it ‘early or late’? ?One often hears this question but it is unhelpful because it is so vague.

The fact that such an important public holiday (2 Bank Holidays and a Sunday on which very little happens) that ?moves around is at best an inconvenience and at worst an impediment to the functioning of many institutions (for example it can distort academic terms) and businesses.? I am not comfortable with the idea that one part of one religion (The Eastern Orthodox Churches celebrate Easter on a different date to those that chosen by the western Christian churches) dictate when our public holidays are.

In a democracy our Parliament is sovereign.? Thus, our parents and grandparents must have thought that this nonsense could be considered history when in 1928 the Easter Act was passed meaning that the date would be forever fixed.? Unfortunately although it sits on the statute book it has never been brought into force, partly because the Act requires that ‘regard’ should be given to the views of the Christian churches and bodies.? How the parliamentary clerks must have laughed – imagine the Christian churches and ‘bodies’ agreeing for long enough for ‘regard’ to be had.? It is of some interest that the Act did not just require that note be taken of the views of the established church but of all ‘official’ churches.? If the Act had been brought into force it would have been influential as it had provision for its use throughout parts of the Empire.? I get some use out of it when discussing legislation with police officers in training sessions by pointing out that passing a law is not the final hurdle.? More recent examples include parts of the Coroners and Criminal Justice Act 2009 (arrangements finally in place September 2024) and the much heralded repeal of the Vagrancy Act 1824, which lingers on like a ghost awaiting final exorcism.

To put everyone, who has had the patience to get this far, out of their misery this year Easter falls on Sunday 20th April 2025.? The date of course has a knock on and back effect on other festivals such Shrove Tuesday (aka Pancake day), Ash Wednesday and Whitsun.??For years I wondered what happened to the Whitsun half term, but having Easter on castors meant that it sometimes fell at times that were far from convenient for schools and their pupils.

The Council of Nicaea (325 CE) set down the principles of how to calculate the date of Easter, however it took another 500 years to settle the detail. Why Christmas and the Saints’ Day are fixed I don’t know.

In the western Christian tradition Easter Sunday falls on the Sunday after the paschal full moon, which is the full moon that falls on or after the spring equinox meaning that Easter Sunday can fall between the 22nd?March and the 25th?April in the Gregorian calendar.? I see people doing this calculation all the time on public transport (or they might be doing the crossword)? The clever boffins at Greenwich point out:

“Unfortunately this simple definition is not strictly speaking correct. The?spring or vernal equinox?used is not the true equinox but an artificial one always assumed to be on 21 March. The?full Moon?used is not the true full Moon but an artificial construct based on the Metonic cycle”

They explain the Metonic cycle and anyone interested should consult their website (below).? Helpfully they include the Carter Algorithm that allows for the calculation of Easter over many decades:

“Calculate D="'225'" - 11(Y MOD 19).

If D is greater than 50 then subtract multiples of 30 until the resulting new value of D is

less than 51.

If D is greater than 48 subtract 1 from it.

Calculate E="'(Y" +' [Y/4] + D + 1) MOD 7. (NB Integer part of [Y/4])

Calculate Q="'D +'" 7 - E.

If Q is less than 32 then Easter is in March. If Q is greater than 31 then Q - 31 is its date in April.

For example, for 1998:

D = 225 - 11*(1998 MOD 19) = 225 - 11*3 = 192

D is greater than 50, therefore:

D = (192 - 5*30) = 42

E = (1998 + [1998/4] + 42 + 1) MOD 7="'2540'" MOD 7="'6'"

Q = 42 + 7 - 6="'43'"

Easter 1998="'43" -' 31="'12" April'”

I suppose you could just use the internet (I was going to say Google it but other, less intrusive, search engines are available).

The serious point is that religious groups are entitled to follow their faiths without let or hindrance.? This includes setting the dates of their festivals.? Public holidays are another thing and these should be set by our Parliaments in the best interests of all of His Majesty’s subjects.

We could perhaps start a petition on the subject to force our politicians to take note (I don’t think they have much on at the moment).? I could don a sandwich board and march up and down Oxford Street proclaiming the need for reform.? (Does anybody remember the bespectacled chap who used to do this proclaiming the dangers of meat and protein? – I miss him when I am in that area, he had become something of a tourist attraction.? I could replace him, I am looking for work).? We could glue ourselves to works of art or encourage our cousins in the US to storm the Capitol (a practice which I believe is now approved of at the highest level).? Alternatively I could rewrite the same blog once a year and annoy the poor souls whose jobs are in danger at Sainsbury’s by asking them if they have any Christmas pudding in stock.

I highly recommend the website of the Royal Museums at Greenwich and am please to acknowledge the site as the source of the quotations contained in this blog.

https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/when-easter? (accessed 23 Jan 2025).

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