The first day of the Roman month was known as the "Calends," and an account book used for computing interest due on that date was called a "Calendarium." This name was also given to a list of the days of the year with the various events which happen on them. In Church usage a "Calendar" marks the days set apart for particular religious celebrations.
We saw in No. 63 that the Christians were in the habit of celebrating the anniversaries of the death of the Martyrs. As these Martyrs gave their lives as a testimony for Christ, our fathers in the faith considered them supremely happy, and their death was not a sorrowful event, but an occasion of joy. Hence the anniversaries of the Martyrs were known as "feasts" or "festivals." When the time of persecution passed, the Church also observed the anniversaries of holy men who had not laid down their lives indeed for the faith, but had persevered in a saintly career. Those men were known as "Confessors," because they had confessed Christ by their actions. As in the case of the Martyrs, the anniversary of their death was celebrated because that was, to use the language of the Liturgy, their birthday in heaven. Besides days of rejoicing, there are times of penance and fasting, when men bewail their sins and implore God for mercy. These days are known as the "Fasts" of the Church.
The day on which Christ rose from the dead was the great day for the Christian world. It was the triumph of our Lord over all His enemies, and it was the proof of His divinity. Christ has promised to come again in the clouds with great power and majesty. When He shall come we do not know, but He has commanded us to be always ready. It was believed that this coming would take place in the night and on the anniversary of the Resurrection. Acting on the injunction to "watch and pray," the early Christians spent the night before the feast of the Resurrection in watching and in praying. From the Latin word "vigilare," which means to watch, we have the word "vigil," signifying the eve of a feast. In the Old Testament we read how the Jews were delivered from Egypt. After many signs and wonders, an angel "passed over" the land, destroying the first-born son in every Egyptian house. The terror inspired by this plague caused Pharaoh, the Monarch of Egypt, to let the Hebrews go. In memory of their deliverance, the Jews celebrated a feast called the "Passover," in Hebrew "Pesach", Latin "Pascha." The feast was a prophecy of the greater deliverance by which the whole human race was redeemed by Christ. Hence the day of the Resurrection was known as the "Pasch." When the faith was preached among the Anglo-Saxons they called the Paschal feast Easter. The word is derived from the name of the Saxon goddess of the Spring or Dawn "Eastra", because the festival falls in the springtime. All Christians, however, excepting those speaking Teutonic languages, call the day by some modification of "Pascha."
Speaking roughly, the moon makes twelve revolutions around the earth in a year. One-twelfth of the year, therefore, is called a "Month," and one-fourth of the month is called a "Week." The week consists of seven days, which are known by the names of the heathen gods Sun, Moon, Tiw (Teu), Woden, Thor, Frigu, and Saetern. In the old law the Jews were commanded to rest on the last day of the week and to keep it holy. From the Hebrew word for rest it was known as the Sabbath. By the coming of Christ all the Jewish ceremonies were abolished, and of course the Sabbath with them. In its place the first day of the week, or the day on which Christ rose from the dead, was kept as a festival day, and was known as the Lord's day. Hence we have the ecclesiastical names for Saturday and Sunday, namely, the Sabbath and the Lord's day. The practice common in England of calling the Sunday the Sabbath is attributable to the Puritans, who confounded the Lord's day with the Hebrew Sabbath. The names of the other days of the week in Church usage are borrowed from Easter week. That whole week was observed as a series of feasts, and, as Sunday was the first feast, Monday was the second feast, Tuesday the third feast, and so on. In Latin the word for holiday is "feria," so in the Ecclesiastical Calendar Monday is Feria 2, Tuesday Feria 3, Wednesday Feria 4, Thursday Feria 5, and Friday Feria 6. It may be noted that the Church follows the usage of the Jews, and in her Liturgy considers that the day lasts from sunset to sunset. In her legislation, however, she follows the civil computation from midnight to midnight.
The period of time during which the earth makes a complete revolution around the sun is known as the "solar year," or sun year. It consists of 365 days and a fraction. It is this fraction which causes most of the trouble to calendar makers. The "civil year," or the year used in business or civil computations, is borrowed from the Romans. Their year began in March, as we may see from the names of September, October, etc., which mean seventh month, eighth month, etc. Julius Caesar made the year begin on the first of January, and he ordered that the odd-numbered months should have thirty-one days and the even-numbered months thirty, excepting February, which should have twenty-nine. His name Julius was given to the ancient fifth month, "Quintilis, " which has since been known as July. His successor, Augustus, considered that he was entitled also to give his name to a month, so the sixth, or "Sextilis," has since been called August. As Sextilis, however, was an even-numbered month, it had only thirty days, so Augustus took one day from February, and gave his own month as many days as July had. Then, to prevent three months of thirty-one days from coming together, September and November were reduced to thirty days, and thirty-one were given to October and December. Hence, in the civil year up to August, the odd-numbered months have an odd number of days, and the even- numbered months an even number of days, while from August onward the case is reversed. Julius Caesar also tried to manage the fraction spoken of above. That fraction is nearly six hours, or one-fourth of a day. Hence he ordered that every four years the year should consist of 366 days, and that the extra day should be given to the shortest month, February. Such a year is said to leap over this day, and is called "Leap Year." This device was intended to keep the solar year and the civil year together. The troublesome fraction is not six hours even, but is a little over eleven minutes short of six hours. Small as this difference is, it amounts to a day in 128 years, and in the course of centuries makes a serious discrepancy between the civil and the solar year. In 1582, it had come to be about ten days, and in that year Pope Gregory XIII ordered that the days between October 4th and October 15th should be sup pressed. As the error in the Julian year is about three days in 400 years, he decreed that three leap years be abolished every four centuries. This is done by making the last year of each century a common year, except when the "number" of the century is divisible by four. Thus the sixteenth was a leap year, but the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth are common years. The period during which the moon makes twelve revolutions around the earth is called the "lunar year," or the moon year. It consists of 354 days, or eleven days less than the solar year. The month is counted from new moon to new moon.
The Church year is "luni-solar," that is to say, it is regulated both by the solar and the lunar year. As we have seen, the feast of Easter is known as the Christian Pasch. The Jews, with whom the Passover originated, used the lunar year. Hence, in calculating Easter we have to follow the same method, and part of the Church year is lunar. As we have borrowed the Roman year for other purposes, and as the Roman year is based on the solar year, part of the Church year is solar. Now, every one knows that the time when the sun is above the horizon is not always equal to the time he is below the horizon. In summer the day is longer than the night, and in winter the night is longer than the day. In fact, there are only two dates in the year when the night is equal to the day. These two dates are called the "equinoxes." The word comes from the Latin, and means equal night. One equinox occurs in March, and is called the Vernal or Spring Equinox, and the other in September, and is called the Autumnal Equinox. The Jews begin their civil year with the new moon of the Autumnal Equinox, but their religious year begins with the new moon of the Vernal Equinox, and at the full moon is celebrated the great festival of the Passover.
"And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: This month shall be to you the beginning of months: it shall be the first of the months of the year. Speak ye to the whole assembly of the children of Israel and say to them: On the tenth day of this month let every man take a lamb by their families and houses. And it shall be a lamb without blemish, a male of one year: according to which rite also ye shall take a kid. And ye shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month: and the whole multitude of the children of Israel shall sacrifice it in the evening. And they shall take the blood thereof, and put it upon both the side posts, and on the upper door posts of the houses, wherein they shall eat it. And they shall eat the flesh that night roasted at the fire, and un leavened bread with wild lettuce. And thus ye shall eat it: ye shall gird your loins, and ye shall have shoes on your feet, holding staves in your hands, and ye shall eat in haste, for it is the Pasch, that is, the Passover of the Lord. And I will pass through the land of Egypt that night and will kill every first-born in the land of Egypt, both man and beast. And the blood shall be unto you a sign on the houses where ye shall be: and I shall see the blood and shall pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you when I shall strike the land of Egypt. And this day shall be for a memorial unto you, and ye shall keep it a feast unto the Lord in your generations with an everlasting observance. Seven days shall ye eat unleavened bread: in the first day there shall be no leaven in your houses: whosoever shall eat anything leavened from the first day until the seventh day, that soul shall perish out of Israel. The first day shall be holy and solemn, and the seventh day shall be kept with the like solemnity." (Exodus 12)
In the beginning some kept the Christian Pasch on the fourteenth day of the first month, no matter on what day of the week it fell. This custom prevailed in Asia Minor. The Roman Church, however, always celebrated the Pasch on Sunday, the day of the Resurrection, and this method was made obligatory by the Council of Nice in 325. Easter then depends on the following conditions:
"(a) It must be celebrated on Sunday.
(b) This Sunday must be the first Sunday after the fourteenth day of the paschal moon.
(c) This Sunday must not be the fourteenth day of the paschal moon, in order to avoid the practice of Asia Minor.
(d) The paschal moon is the moon whose fourteenth day (full moon) falls on or next follows the day of the Vernal Equinox."
Hence, in short: Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon on or after March 21st. This is the first point in the Ecclesiastical year, and, as it does not always fall on the same date, it is a movable point, and the feasts calculated from it are called movable feasts. The second point in the year for the calculation of movable feasts is the 25th of December, Christmas Day. On these two points revolve the great cycles or circles of feasts and fasts.
Taking Easter as the center, we count backwards and forwards. Counting back wards, we have the Forty Days of Lent and the three weeks of preparation for Lent, styled Septuagesima. The six Sundays in Lent are known as the first, second, third and fourth of Quadragesima, Passion Sunday and Palm Sunday. Counting forwards, we have five Sundays after Easter, then Ascension Thursday, and in ten days Pentecost. The Sundays after Pentecost run on until they clash with Advent.
The feast of Christmas is regulated by the Civil Year. It is always held on the twenty-fifth of December, no matter what day of the week it falls on. The Four Sundays before Christmas are called Advent, and correspond to Lent, i.e., as a season of preparation. The first of January is Circumcision, and the 6th of January is Epiphany, or Little Christmas. The Sundays after Epiphany are counted like the Sundays after Pentecost, and run on until they clash with Septuagesima. When Easter is early the unused Sundays are taken up before the Last Sunday after Pentecost.
Christmas is what we call a Fixed Feast, because it always falls on the same day of the month. The festivals of the saints are practically all fixed feasts, as you may see by consulting a calendar.
In modern times a new series of movable feasts grew up dependent on the month or the week of the Civil Year. Thus, the first Sunday in July was dedicated to the Precious Blood, and the first Sunday in October to the Rosary. The legislation of Pius X has been unfavorable to this movement, and fixed dates have been provided for such feasts, though, in the case of some, provision is made for saying their Mass on the old Sunday. Popular devotion consecrates the First Friday of each month to the Sacred Heart, while March is dedicated to Saint Joseph, May to the Blessed Virgin, October to the Rosary, November to the Faithful Departed.
Besides the Sundays, the Church Law, Canon 1247, prescribes that the following ten feasts should be kept in the same manner as Sundays, namely, by attending Mass and abstaining from servile work: Christmas, New Year, Epiphany, Ascension and Corpus Christi, the Immaculate Conception and the Assumption, Saint Joseph's Day, Saints Peter and Paul, and All Saints. In the United States the number has been reduced to six, namely, three feasts of our Lord Christmas Day, New Year's Day and the Ascension; two of our Lady, the Assumption and the Immaculate Conception, and one of all the saints, All Saints Day, November 1st.
We have already seen what is meant by a Vigil. The fasting Vigils are reduced to five: Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, Assumption and All Saints . On the Easter Vigil the fast ends at 12 noon. The Octave is a prolongation of a feast for eight days. Formerly the conferring of Holy Orders took place four times a year. Before the ceremony the people gave themselves to prayer and fasting that God would give good ministers to His Church. They occur four times a year, and are called "Quatuor Tempora," or Quarter Tense. We usually know them as Ember Days. In spring they are kept on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday in the week, after the first Sunday in Lent. In summer they occur in Pentecost Week, in fall during the week after September 14th, and in winter in the week after the third Sunday in Advent.
As we have seen in No. 98, a person who gave up his life for the faith was called a "Martyr"; a saint who did not die for the faith, but confessed it by his life, was known as a "Confessor." In the calendar the title Martyr simply is put after a saint's name if he were a layman or if he were in Orders lower than the Episcopate. Only in a few cases is the simple priesthood set forth, e.g., Saint Valentine and Saint Jerome. The Apostles and Evangelists bear the title Apostle or Evangelist simply, because they were all martyrs. A Confessor is either a Bishop and Confessor or a Confessor simply. The Popes are entitled Pope and Martyr or Pope and Confessor, as the case may be. The great heads of the Monastic houses or Orders (No. 96) are known as Abbots. Men who have rendered great service to the Church by their writings are called Doctors of the Church. Women are known as Virgins or Widows, with the title Martyr added if they have died for the faith. Kings and Queens are given their royal designations.
The Easter and Christmas Cycles provide for the celebration of the Liturgy during the whole year. Outside of the greater feasts, such as Pentecost and the like, the Offices or the Prayers to be said are called either Sunday or Ferial Offices. Now, the growth of fixed feasts interferes with the saying of these Offices. Originally, when a great saint's day came on a Feria, that is to say, on a day of the week (No. 100), two Offices were recited, the Office of the Feria depending on the Easter or Christmas Cycle and the Office of the Saint. Hence, such a day was called a "Double." In some cases, where the Saint was not so renowned, a compromise was made and the Offices of the Saint and Feria were blended into one. Such a day was called a "semi-double," or half-double. Where the name of the Saint was barely mentioned the day was called a "simple."
- taken from The Mass, by Father Peter Christopher Yorke