Almost all parishes of the Orthodox Church in Western Europe and America switched to celebrating Christmas according to the New Julian calendar on December 25th. It coincides with the Catholic Gregorian, but has some features.
The religious scholar and Doctor of Philosophy Lyudmila Filippovich told Channel 24 about this. According to her, the transition to the new Julian calendar is a rather complicated process.
Transition is a complex process
Filippovich noted that the transition to another calendar is not just a decree of the Metropolitan or the Patriarch, they say, from today we celebrate Christmas on December 25th. First of all, you need to prepare people so that they can consciously deal with the corresponding changes.
It is necessary to actually rewrite the calendar according to which the church now lives, and this is a colossal time and resource cost. Specialists should sit down and carefully check everything, although we have such experience,” the religious scholar said.
According to her, the Romanian Church has already switched to celebrating Christmas according to the New Julian calendar, so experts can be invited and their experience of the transition can be used. At the moment, a joint calendar commission has been established between Ukrainian Greek Catholics and Orthodox Christians.
So, they will work on this issue, since these two churches actually live according to the same Eastern rite and calendar.
Filippovich about the transition of the church to the New Julian calendar: watch the video
“Let's hope that the two minds – Greek Catholic and Orthodox – will come to an agreement and soon we will be in normal calendar conditions,” summed up the doctor of philosophy.
Ukrainians celebrated Christmas on December 25
This year, Ukrainian society, without instructions from church structures, but on its own initiative, celebrated Christmas on December 25th. According to the vice-rector of the Ukrainian Catholic University Miroslav Marinovich, this is a very interesting phenomenon.
Marinovich noted that in this way the parishioners of both churches showed that they were waiting for the corresponding decision of the Synods of Bishops regarding the transition.
So, in the people themselves there is a formula that is sufficiently weighted for the transition time. Namely, to give the right to local communities to decide how to be at this moment – to celebrate according to one calendar or another.
I like this option because it does not injure the human soul, – said Marinovich.
According to him, there are different situations. So, there are people who have already completely switched to celebrating Christmas on December 25th. At the same time, there are those who consider January 7 as their holiday or those who still hesitate about the transition.
Note that Channel 24 has prepared an interesting material about Ukrainians who celebrated Christmas for the first time on December 25th. The history of the celebration – read the link.
