With a number of Catholics from Poland working in Weymouth, and Polish Masses regularly being said at one of our two Churches, it is interesting to learn about Polish traditions at Easter. Alicia Watkins tells us about them below.
Alicia writes:
As a Catholic of Polish origin, Holy Saturday is a day when we go to Church for the traditional blessing of Easter food. I was raised with this old and lovely tradition, common to Eastern European Catholics.
We bring baskets containing samples of the Easter food, Swienconka, decorated in various ways. People put great effort into decorating the baskets and it is good to see the beautiful baskets arranged in the Church.
The contents of the Easter basket varies from family to family and here are the most important contents and their meanings:
Pisanki: Coloured boiled eggs symbolize life and rebirth, and especially Christ’s Resurrection from the tomb.
A peeled boiled egg: The same meaning as above. The egg is shared with the family at the Easter Breakfast
Kielbasa: A spicy sausage of pork products, indicating God’s favour and generosity. In the old days, all types of pork were forbidden until the coming of Christ when it became acceptable.
Baranek Wielkanocny: A sugar lamb, representing Christ Resurrected -
Pepper and Horsradish: Symbolize the bitter herbs of the Passover and Exodus.
Bread: Symbolizes Christ, “the Bread of Life”
Salt: “You are the salt of the earth”
Vinegar: Symbolizes the gall given to Christ at his crucifixion
Wine: Symbolizes the blood of the sacrifice spilt by Christ at his crucifixion
On Easter Day we will have an Easter Breakfast; the whole family will share the peeled boiled egg and the other goodies and exchange best wishes to each other.
I wish you all a Happy Easter 2008!
Our Lord was crucified on the Jewish Passover, 14th Nisan, the first month of the Jewish Calendar.
The Jewish calendar is based on the lunar month, the time between successive new moons or full moons. The problem with a lunar calendar is that it does not fit with the solar calendar. In time the lunar months and feast days move progressively though the seasons. (This still happens with the Moslem Ramadan which progressively moves around the year).
The 14th Nisan was kept in step with the solar year by Jewish scholars adding extra days, or months to ensure that it always occurred in the spring.
In the early years of the Church, the dioceses of Asia tended to celebrate Easter on 14th Nisan, the date of the Jewish Passover. However, for the Churches of the rest of the world, it became the custom to celebrate Easter on a Sunday, the day of Our Lord's Resurrection. The question thus debated was therefore primarily whether Easter was to be kept on a Sunday or whether Christians should observe the fourteenth of Nisan, which might occur on any day of the week.
In around 150 AD, St Polycarp, from Asia Minor came to Rome to debate this with Pope Anacetus, but eventually they agreed to differ to prevent schism. Eventually at the end of this 2nd century, Pope St Victor I excommunicated the dwindling group of 'Quartodecimans' as they were called.
The Council of Nicaea in 325, convened by the Emperor Constantine, agreed that the date of Easter should fall on the Sunday after the Full Moon after the spring Equinox (21st March). The problem was then how to calculate for the years to come the the date of the first full moon after 21st March. After the council of Nicaea, the Church at Alexandria was given the task of calculating the dates of Easter because they were the best astronomers. But they did fall out from time to time with Rome and compromises had to be made.
In addition, at that time, the Julian Calendar was being used, which requires a leap day every fourth year. As the centuries rolled by, it was realised that this led to an extra 3 days in the calendar every 400 years.
By the 1500's the calendar was out of kilter with the seasons by about 12 days. Pope Gregory XIII set up a special commission to reform the calendar. This reported in 1580 and in 1582, Pope Gregory XIII formally instituted the new calendar. This followed the old calendar for the most part, but set New Year's day to be 1st January and added an extra rule, that if the century number was divisible by 4, then there was not to be a leap year. So 1700,1800,1900 were not leap years, but the years 1600 and 2000 were leap years. As can be seen, this simple rule removes three days out of the Julian calendar every 400 years. England like other protestant countries did not adopt the Gregorian system until 1752, when 12 days were removed from the calendar leading to riots ('give us back our 12 days'). At the same time, England changed the date of the New Year from 25th March to 1st January. Today's relic of the old system remains in our tax year which starts on 5th April, some 11/12 days after 25th March.
Even today, to calculate the exact date of the phases of the moon is a challenging
problem, because there are complicated gravitational pulls from the sun, moon, and
other celestial bodies; also the slightly elliptical orbits of the earth and the
moon and even the earth's spin on its axis. Modern day Catholic Astronomers at the
Vatican Observatory have derived a complex algorithm, taking 14 steps which results
in an almost precise Easter date -
To to answer the question, this year the first full moon after 21st March occurred this year on 22nd March, a Saturday. This meant that Easter Sunday was to be the very next day.
Parishioners attending the Easter vigil service would have noticed a fine full moon rising over Weymouth on the evening of Holy Saturday.
References
'The Calendar' by David Ewing Duncan ISBN 1-