As soon as it starts to get warmer, we start to think about Easter. But, unlike most holidays, the date of Easter changes every year, so we always have to ask, “When is Easter this year?” Here’s what you need to know about important dates and details of Easter day and why the date of Easter changes.
When Easter Day Will Be Celebrated in 2023?
Each year, Easter falls between March 21 and April 25, depending on when the Spring full moon is. Easter will be on Sunday, April 9, 2023.
Easter Sunday and related holidays like Ash Wednesday and Palm Sunday are called “moveable feasts.” But in the west, where Christians use the Gregorian calendar, Easter is always on a Sunday between March 22 and April 25.
How Does the Date of Easter Change From Year to Year?
First of all, it’s important to know that the exact date of Easter changes every year, but that it always falls between March 22 and April 25 (in the Gregorian calendar, not the Julian calendar). The Old Farmer’s Almanac says that Easter is always on the first Sunday after the Paschal Full Moon. This is the first full moon after the vernal equinox, which marks the beginning of spring in the northern hemisphere.
The spring equinox will happen on March 20, 2023. The next full moon will be on April 6, and Easter will be the following Sunday, April 9.
Why Do We Celebrate Easter?
The New Testament of the Bible tells how Jesus was arrested by the Romans because he said he was the “Son of God.” This is the story behind Easter.
Pontius Pilate, who was the Roman emperor at the time, then gave him a death sentence by crucifixion. Three days later, when he came back to life, we celebrate Easter. The Jewish holiday of Passover is also closely linked to this day.
How Easter is Celebrated?
Easter is a happy holiday and the Sunday before it is called Palm Sunday to remember when Jesus came to Jerusalem. Several churches start the celebration late on Saturday night with a service called Easter Vigil.
Easter is also connected to the Jewish holiday of Passover and the story in the Old Testament about how the Jews left Egypt.
People often give each other brightly coloured eggs filled with candy or chocolate on Easter. People choose to spend a lot of money on Easter weekend because it comes after a 40-day period of fasting.
Nonreligious ways to celebrate Easter include the tradition of Easter eggs, which stand for birth and fertility, and the Easter bunny, which brings chocolate and other treats to children on Sunday mornings. Other non-religious Easter traditions include going on a treasure hunt to find Easter eggs and playing games like rolling eggs and decorating them.
What Does the Word “Easter” Mean?
Anyone who wants to know where the word Easter came from and what it means can find different explanations in the literature:
In many European languages, the word for Easter is related to the word for the Jewish Passover. This is true in French (Paques), Italian (Pasqua), Dutch (Pasen), and Danish (Paske).
From what Christians believe, Easter seems to come from the East. This is because the first people to stand at Jesus’ empty tomb were women, and they were looking east towards the rising sun (Latin for “aurora”).
The name of a Germanic goddess of spring, Ostara, is said to be where the word Easter comes from. It is said that a pagan spring festival was named after her. But experts in language say that this never existed.
Jürgen Udolph, who is an expert on names, has a more recent explanation. He makes a link to a group of North Germanic words. “Ausa” means “to scoop out water, to pour,” and “Austr” means “to water” in Old Norse.
So, before Christianity, it was common to bless babies by pouring water on them. This was called Vatni Ausa. Baptism was an important part of the early Easter celebrations, so Christianity took this name for it.
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