International (MNN) — Are you celebrating Easter this Sunday? If so, you must be part of the Eastern Orthodox Church, which is in the middle of Holy Week.
The difference in date comes from two calendars systems. The Eastern Orthodox Church follows the Julian calendar created by Julius Caesar in the first century BC. However, most Western countries follow the Gregorian calendar, which was introduced more than 400 years ago as a reform of the Julian Calendar.
(Photo is a representative stock photo courtesy of Mateusz Butkiewicz via Unsplash.)
Regardless of the historical details behind this difference in Easter dates, this week is another moment the global Church can stand together.
“It’s such an important time to be praying for our brothers and sisters in parts of the world where the celebrations are still going on,” says Denise Godwin with International Media Ministries (IMM).
The West has celebrated Easter already, but Godwin encourages you to “continue to remember our brothers and sisters who are either in a country that’s Muslim, and they’re trying to live out their faith in great distress, or the Orthodox countries. You think of Russia, Armenia, Greece, (places) that are having a lot of stress, culturally.”
Godwin says that even among cultures that don’t widely honor Easter, it’s still a time where many people think twice as the holy day comes.
Another spiritually significant fact in 2024 was that Easter in most Western countries (March 31) and Ramadan for Muslims (March 10-April 9) overlapped. They don’t always do so.
Now that you know, would you take this moment to pray?
“Whatever differences we can have amongst the different traditions inside Christianity, it’s important to encourage one another, build one another up and stand together for the cross of Jesus Christ and the truth of that,” Godwin says.
IMM uses media to bring the hope of Christ to Europe, Eurasia, Africa and the Middle East. You can learn more about them and their cross-cultural, multi-lingual resources here.
Header photo is a stock image courtesy of Ch P/Unsplash.
