5th March 2025
Christian (Western Churches)
The first day of Lent when Christians remember the forty days that Jesus spent in the wilderness and the temptations he faced during this time. In Catholic and some Anglican churches, services are held where the worshipper’s forehead is marked with a cross of ash, which has been made from burning the palm crosses of the previous year – hence the name Ash Wednesday.
Matthew 4:1-11, Mark 1:12-13, Luke 4:1-13
5th March – 17th April 2025
Christian (Western Churches)
Lent is a period of forty days (not counting Sundays) that leads up to Easter. It is a time of fasting, repentance, moderation, self-denial and spiritual discipline in preparation for Easter. The purpose is to set aside time for reflection on the suffering and sacrifice of Jesus, his life, death, burial, and resurrection. Traditionally Christians give up something during this time – a habit, such as smoking, watching TV, or swearing, or a food or drink, such as sweets, chocolate or coffee – to mark the forty days Jesus spent in the wilderness, which end on Easter day. Many still do this, but the emphasis is now more on following a simpler lifestyle throughout the year. Those who give up something save the cost of these items for Church funds or a charity. For many Christians it is a time for study groups, and Bible reading.
In Western Christianity, Ash Wednesday marks the first day, or the start of the season of Lent, which begins 40 days prior to Easter (Technically 46, as Sundays are not included in the count). The exact date changes every year because Easter and its surrounding holidays are movable feasts. The significance of the 40-day period of Lent is based on two episodes of spiritual testing in the Bible: the 40 years of wilderness wandering by the Israelites, and the Temptation of Jesus after he spent 40 days fasting in the wilderness.
In Orthodox churches, the spiritual preparations for Pascha (Easter) begin with Great Lent, a 40-day period of self-examination and fasting (including Sundays), which starts on Clean Monday (seven weeks before Easter Sunday) and culminates on Lazarus Saturday (eight days before Easter Sunday) which signifies the end of Great Lent. Fasting continues however during the Holy Week of Orthodox Easter. Ash Wednesday is not observed.
The Bible does not mention the custom of Lent, although, the practice of repentance and mourning in ashes is a Biblical one, found in 2 Samuel 13:19; Esther 4:1; Job 2:8; Daniel 9:3; and Matthew 11:21. Likewise, the word ‘Easter’ does not appear in the Bible and no early church celebrations of the resurrection of Jesus are mentioned in the new Testament. Easter, like Christmas, is a tradition that developed later in Church history.
Many Christians who observe Lent celebrate Shrove Tuesday, also called Fat Tuesday or Mardi Gras, (French for Fat Tuesday), the day before Lent starts. Traditionally, pancakes are eaten to use up rich foods like eggs and dairy in anticipation of the 40-day fasting season of Lent. The name Shrove comes from the old English word ‘shrive’ which means to confess. On Shrove Tuesday, in the Middle Ages, people used to confess their sins so that they would receive forgiveness before the season of Lent began.
Matthew 3:13-17, Mark 1:9-11, Luke 3:21-22.
1st March 2025
Christian
This international, interdenominational prayer movement was begun in 1887. The service material is produced by a different country each year. In 2020 the theme will be ‘Rise, Take Your Mat, and Walk’, and the material has been prepared by Christian women in Zimbabwe.
30th March 2025
Christian
Mid-Lent Sunday, the 4th Sunday in Lent, has now become secularised and is more popularly known as Mother’s Day. It was, traditionally, a Sunday when Christians revisited their ‘mother church’ and took gifts to their mothers, which often included a simnel cake.
3rd March 2025
Christian (Orthodox)
This is the beginning of the Lenten Fast, which involves abstinence from meat, fish and dairy products until Easter.
Unlike the Western tradition, where Lent begins on the Wednesday before the first Sunday of Lent, Eastern Churches start Lent on the Monday before the first Sunday. In addition, since Lent is calculated in relation to Easter, it follows that when the Orthodox date for Easter differs from that of the Western Churches, as here, the whole Lenten period will similarly differ.
19th March 2025
Christian
In some churches a feast day is held in honour of Joseph, who, together with Mary, was responsible for Jesus’ upbringing.
14th – 19th April 2025
Christian (Western Churches)
This is the most solemn week of the Christian year, in which Christians recall the events of the final week of the earthly life of Jesus.
13th April 2025 (Christian)
9th April 2025 (Christian Orthodox)
Palm Sunday is the final Sunday of Lent and the first day of Holy Week, when Christians remember Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, where, later, he would be arrested and crucified. Many churches commemorate the day by processions, with the congregation carrying symbolic palm leaves (folded in the form of a cross) or branches of palm trees.
Five days before the Passover, Jesus came from Bethany to Jerusalem. Having sent two of His disciples to bring him a colt of a donkey, he sat upon it and entered the city. The gospels record his arrival, riding into the city on a donkey, while the crowds spread their cloaks and palm branches on the street and shouted ‘Hosanna to the Son of David’ and ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord’ to honour him as their long-awaited Messiah and King.
During Palm Sunday services, palms are distributed to parishioners who carry them in a ritual procession into church. The palms are blessed and many people fashion them into small crosses or other items of personal devotion. These may be returned to the church, or kept for the year. Because the palms have been blessed, they may not be discarded as trash. In many cases they are collected at the church and incinerated to create the ashes that will be used in the following year’s Ash Wednesday observance.
The celebration of Palm Sunday originated in the Jerusalem Church, around the late fourth century. The ceremony consisted of prayers, hymns, and sermons recited by the clergy while the people walked to various holy sites throughout the city. At the final site, the place where Jesus ascended into heaven, the clergy read from the gospels concerning the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. In the early evening they returned to the city reciting: ‘Blessed is He that comes in the name of the Lord.’ The children carried palm and olive branches as the people returned through the city back to the church, where they would hold evening services.
By the fifth century, the Palm Sunday celebration had spread as far as Constantinople. Changes made in the sixth and seventh centuries resulted in two new Palm Sunday traditions – the ritual blessing of the palms, and a morning procession instead of an evening one. Adopted by the Western Church in the eighth century, the celebration received the name ‘Dominica in Palmis,’ or ‘Palm Sunday’.
Today, Palm Sunday traditions in Roman Catholic churches are much the same as they have been since the tenth century. The ceremony begins with the blessing of the palms. The procession follows, then Mass is celebrated, and the Passion and the Benediction are sung. Afterwards, many people take the palms home and place them in houses, barns, and fields. The colours of the Mass on Palm Sunday are red and white, symbolizing the redemption in blood that Jesus paid for the world.
In Orthodox churches Palm Sunday is celebrated with the Divine Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom, which is preceded by the Matins service. A Great Vespers is conducted on the preceding Saturday evening, according to the order prescribed in the Triodion. On this Sunday a basket containing the woven palm crosses is placed on a table in front of the icon of the Lord. The palms are then distributed to the faithful, as a blessing upon those who hold the palms in their hands.
In the simplest of terms, Palm Sunday is an occasion for reflecting on the final week of Jesus’ life. It is a time for Christians to prepare their hearts for the agony of His Passion and the joy of His Resurrection.
Matthew 21:1-11, Mark 11:1-11, Luke 19:28-40, John 12:12-19.
25th March 2025
Christian (Anglican and Orthodox)
Lady Day (National)
One of the four Quarter Days in the UK legal calendar.
Lady Day celebrates the angel Gabriel announcing to Mary that she is to bear a child, and Mary’s response in the Magnificat. The day provides an opportunity to focus on the doctrine of the incarnation. Luke 1:26-38, 46-55.
18th April 2025
Christian (Western Churches)
This day commemorates the crucifixion of Jesus. Although essentially a sombre day, it is called ‘Good Friday’ since, for Christians, it is ‘God’s Friday’, and recalls how Jesus chose to give up his life for others. To Christians, the day is not just a historical event but commemorates the sacrificial death of Jesus, which, along with the resurrection, comprises the heart of the Christian faith.
Church services recall the account of Jesus’ death as given in the gospels. Jesus was questioned, beaten, and sentenced to death by the Roman governor Pontius Pilate. Soldiers placed a crown of thorns on his head with a sign that read ‘The King of the Jews’, and stripped him of his clothing. He was led to a place called Golgotha, where they nailed him to a cross along with two other criminals. He died on the cross that afternoon and was laid in a donated tomb, buried according to custom.
The celebration of Good Friday stems from ancient times. According to Egeria, writing in a 4th century letter to her ‘sisters’, Christians in Jerusalem spent Good Friday at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, a large compound of courtyards and chapels built over the site of Jesus’ crucifixion, burial, and resurrection. In the morning they engaged in the Veneration of the Cross. From noon to three in the afternoon they attended a series of Bible readings, including the Passion story.
For Christians today, there is no Mass or Eucharist on Good Friday. Communion, if taken, comes from hosts consecrated on Holy Thursday. The major Good Friday worship service begins in the afternoon at 3:00 PM (the time Jesus is said to have died). It consists of seven sermons on the seven last words of Jesus. This service has become popular in many Protestant churches.
The Veneration of the Cross is another frequent practice, when Christians approach a wooden cross and venerate it, often by kneeling before it, or kissing part of it. On Good Friday many churches also celebrate the ‘Stations of the Cross’ (often called the ‘Way of the Cross’), a devotion in which fourteen events surrounding the death of Jesus are commemorated.
The Eastern Churches have different customs for the day they call ‘Great Friday’. Evening Prayer ends with a solemn veneration of the epitaphion, an embroidered veil containing scenes of Christ’s burial. Compline (Night Prayer) includes a lamentation as from the Virgin Mary. On Good Friday night, a symbolic burial of Christ is performed. In Russian Orthodox churches a silver coffin is placed in the church for the faithful to venerate the image of Jesus painted on the winding sheet or shroud.
The Church – stripped of its ornaments, the altar bare, and with the door of the empty tabernacle standing open – is as if it is in mourning. The organ is silent from Holy Thursday until the Alleluia at the Easter Vigil, as are all Church bells and other instruments, the only music during this period being an unaccompanied chant. Traditionally Good Friday was the day when everything was cleaned and whitewashed in preparation for Easter Sunday, but churches are not decorated on Good Friday – in some, pictures and statues are covered over. It is indeed a time of mourning.
Good Friday is an official fast day within the Roman Catholic Church. Fasting means eating only one (meatless) meal on this day. (Fish rather than meat is eaten on all Fridays). Hot cross buns, said to have originated at St Alban’s Abbey in 1361, are particularly associated with Good Friday.
The sacramental ‘mark’ of the cross is important to Catholic people to this day. They are anointed with it, at baptism and at confirmation, and the sign is used at the ordination of a priest or bishop. In the sacrament of the sick the priest anoints the person with the sign of the cross made with oil; and, on Ash Wednesday, foreheads are marked with the sign of the cross made with palm ashes.
The most common cross for Catholics is a crucifix – a cross with the image of Christ’s body nailed to it. Crucifixes are found in all Roman Catholic churches and chapels and are regularly carried in liturgical processions. This image is venerated by the faithful in a special ceremony on Good Friday.
Matthew 27:32-34, Mark 15:21-32, Luke 23:26-43, John 19:17-27.