Happy Resurrection Day on April 9, 2009.

This year the anniversary of the greatest event in the history of the world falls on April 8, 2009.

Here is the Roman method for computing Resurrection Day:

• Easter falls on the first Sunday (Sabbath) following the first ecclesiastical full moon that occurs on or after March 21 (the day of the ecclesiastical vernal equinox).
• This particular ecclesiastical full moon is the 14th day of a tabular lunation (new moon).

Most often, the Roman new moon falls before the equinox or new year, and therefore that full moon belongs to the previous year. This year is the rare exception when Resurrection Day falls close to the Jewish Passover.

A lunation is the time from ONE new moon to another!!

Since the time of Galileo with his brainless heliocentric theory, people have stopped looking up and studying the heavens for themselves.

Here is the dictionary definition of a LUNATION:

"The time that elapses between successive new moons, averaging 29 days, 12 hours, 44 minutes; a lunar month."

A month consists of about 30 days and a FULL moon belongs to that month's waxing and and waning moon.

New moon on March 26.

About 14 days!! The new moon following the EQUINOX, or new year, falls on March 26, 2009.

Full moon on April 9.

"Either of the two times during a year when the sun crosses the celestial equator and when the length of day and night are approximately equal; the vernal equinox or the autumnal equinox." (Webster's Third New International Dictionary).

The Passover—the anniversary of the Exodus from Egyptian bondage— was always celebrated on the 14th day of the FIRST MONTH of the Jewish calendar.

The Lord told Moses:

"This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be the first month of the year to you" (Exodus 12:2).

This was always at the time of the full moon, following the new moon, after the spring equinox.

JEHOVAH told Moses:

"In the fourteenth day of the FIRST MONTH at even is the LORD's passover" (Leviticus 23:5).

"And they kept the passover on the fourteenth day of the FIRST MONTH at even in the wilderness of Sinai: according to all that the LORD commanded Moses, so did the children of Israel" (Numbers 9:5).

Roman dates for Easter from 1999 to 2007

The feast of the Passover and Resurrection was celebrated every year by the Christians on the 14th of the month following the new moon, following the equinox....It was the most important holiday on their calendar. Here is a quote from one of  the Early Congregation Fathers named Saint Anatolius of Laodicea:

" . . .Following their example up to the present time all the bishops of Asia — as themselves also receiving the rule from an unimpeachable authority, to wit, the evangelist John, who leant on the Lord's breast, and drank in instructions spiritual without doubt — were in the way of celebrating the Paschal feast, without question, every year, whenever the fourteenth day of the moon had come, and the lamb was sacrificed by the Jews after the equinox was past."

Here is the reason why the Passover was held at the time of the full moon. Quoting again from Saint Anatolius:

"But it is clear that in the Paschal feast it is not possible that any part of the darkness should surpass the light; for the festival of the Lord's resurrection is one of light, and there is no fellowship between light and darkness. And if the moon should rise in the third watch, it is clear that the 22d or 23d of the moon would then be reached, in which it is not possible that there can be a true celebration of Easter. For those who determine that the festival may be kept at this age of the moon, are not only unable to make that good by the authority of Scripture, but turn also into the crime of sacrilege and contumacy, and incur the peril of their souls; inasmuch as they affirm that the true light may be celebrated along with something of that power of darkness which dominates all." Saint Anatolius of Laodicea:

In the ancient world the night was divided into 4 watches

When the moon rises after midnight — in the 3rd watch — the darkness is greater than the light for that particular night.

Hibernian (Irish) missionary rebukes the Pope for changing the date of the anniversary of the Lord's Resurrection!!

The Hibernian Christians received their Christianity from St. Patrick and he was a member of the British Congregation founded by the Apostle Paul around 60 A.D.

They adhered to the ancient and apostolic pattern. Everywhere they went they were followed by the Roman monks who insisted on their following the corrupt computation of Pope Constantine. It was the greatest controversy of the Dark Ages. Here is a letter from the great Hibernian missionary Saint Columban of Bobbio to Pope Gregory:

" What is your opinion," he asks,  "of an Easter celebrated on the 21st or 22nd moon, which many calculators have shown to be a dark Easter? For I believe it cannot be unknown to your Holiness how disparagingly Anatolius, whom Jerome calls a man of wondrous learning", and whom Eusebius of Caesarea quotes in his Ecclesiastical History, speaks of this age of the moon.
It was unchristian, Columban argues, to keep Easter later than the 20th day after the new moon, because according to Holy Scripture," the Feast of the Passover should be observed only between the 14th and 20th day after the new moon; it was a crime to celebrate the resurrection of the Lord at a time when darkness was more powerful than light, for after the 20th of the lunar month the moon does not rise till after midnight; it was absurd to celebrate Easter on the 23rd or 24th of March, for, as the vernal equinox falls on 25 March and Christ died after this equinox, that would be to commemorate the Resurrection before the Passion."(Metlake, The Life and Writings of Saint Columban, p.132).

Christ our Passover!!

The great antitype of the deliverance from Egyptian bondage was the death and Resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. This great event took place on the anniversary of the Exodus:

"Now before the feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was come that he should depart out of this world" (John 13:1).

St. Paul said:

"For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures;
And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:
And that he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve:
After that, he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep.
After that, he was seen of James; then of all the apostles.
And last of all he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time." (I Cor. 15:3-8).

And again:

"But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.
For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.
For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." (I Cor. 15:20-22).

Reference

Metlake, George.The Life and Writings of Saint Columban. The Dophin Press, Philadelphia, 1914. (Imprimatur Edmond F. Prendergast, Archbishop of Philadelphia).

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