We all know (or should know!) that the most important feast of the liturgical year is Easter. Certainly, its importance is theological and liturgical, because salvation, which we celebrate and make present liturgically each year, came from the Lord’s Passion, death, and resurrection. 
But Easter is also important for the “practical structuring” of the liturgical year, in the sense that many feasts or dates in the liturgical year are established each year precisely from its date. 
Unlike Christmas, Easter is a “movable” feast, meaning that it changes every year. Why? Because, deriving from the Jewish Passover, it is linked to the lunar calendar and is celebrated on the first Sunday after the spring full moon. 

Once the date of Easter has been established, many dates in the liturgical year are determined:
– the beginning of Lent, with Ash Wednesday falling on the Wednesday preceding the sixth Sunday before Easter;
– Holy Week;
– the Ascension (the sixth Sunday after Easter);
– Pentecost (the seventh Sunday after Easter); this solemnity concludes the Easter Season.

Then come some solemnities of Ordinary Time:
– the Most Holy Trinity (the first Sunday after Pentecost);
– the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ (the second Sunday after Pentecost);
– the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus (the Friday after the Sunday of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ).

According to a very ancient tradition, the date of Easter and the related feasts (whose dates vary) of the new liturgical year are announced on Epiphany, after the proclamation of the Gospel. This is because, in ancient times, only a few people were able to calculate the movable dates of the feasts astronomically, and homes did not yet have calendars as they do today! 

But why is this announcement made precisely on Epiphany? Because the full manifestation of Jesus Christ as the Savior of the world, foreshadowed in his Epiphany to the holy Magi, is fully revealed and accomplished through his Easter of death, burial, and resurrection.

To learn more about the liturgical seasons and liturgical feasts, consult the Shalom 2023 Pastoral Calendar!