Tuesday, December 29, 2009

A peek at the calendar... some good news and some not

Christ is born! Merry Christmas to all.

2010 is almost here. First the good news; the month of January is looking to be a (comparatively) light month for fasting. The Nativity fast free period runs through the 4th of January. The last week in January will also be fast free. Those on the Traditional (Old) Church Calendar will have pretty much the whole month fast free (but they will pay for it later). Which brings us to the not so good news (unless you really enjoy fasting). The rest of the year has an awful lot of red on the calendar even by Orthodox standards.

Lent comes earlier this year than I can remember. It begins in early February with Pascha (Easter) falling on April 4th. Which in turn means the Apostle's Fast starts much earlier. You can just wipe out the entire month of June. Those on the Old Calendar can add two more weeks to that already longer than normal fast.

Oh well. The joys of being Orthodox and all that.

1 comment:

BJohnD said...

I'd noticed that, as well. Pascha will be later next year (April 24/11) (and, surprisingly, the same again for East and West). We'll have to wait until 2013 for a good old-fashioned late Pascha (May 5/April 22), with all that it entails for the fasting calendar.