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Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
In that case, I don't know which scientific disciplines use the Julian calendar or whether you are (or are not) correct about the liturgical issues involved etc.
Let me say again, science does not use any calendar for scientific measurements. The only reason this issue has arisen is because of the false claim made about the Julian calendar by some of its more militant and misguided advocates. They wanted to use this alleged scientific accuracy to argue for the superiority and, therefore, proper use of the Julian over the Gregorian calendar on that basis. Knowing the truth and the falseness of their claim, however, they by their own argument should have then had to advocate the superiority of the Gregorian over the Julian (based on accurate science, not to do science) but such consistency and equitability could for some (most?, all?) not be mustered. What pretense.

As regards "liturgical issues," the typicon is the same for both calendars. What can the problem possibly be? (As I've said before the problem comes in mixing, observing fixed-date Gregorian feasts with the Julian paschalion.)

Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
My knee-jerk reaction was to defend Fr. Keleher. If that is a vice, I'm sorry. We haven't had even one Orthodox Old Calendarist defend his or her position here with the same scientific (and other important) precisions that you have. Perhaps this will be remedied in the near future.
Defend Fr. Serge all you want; defending his incorrect assertions is another matter. There have been on this forum extensive (i.e. many words) defenses of the Julian calendar and paschalion involving science and otherwise. It was to balance and in some instance refute those claims that I began to write in response.

Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
Personally, I don't care which calendar is used - I've said that.
You should care though if, for instance, I_Nicaea and not having calendar-spring move into the summer matters. The error in the Julian calendar is certainly there but slow in accumulating, so one can get away with a laissez-faire attitude that simply dispenses with the incorrect timing. But in time, maybe even now, a Julian calendar die-hard farmer, for instance, is planting his crops by the Gregorian calendar March 21 spring, not the Julian, as a matter of practical necessity.

Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
My only and over-arching concern is that which, as Fr. Deacon Richard noted above, is about ensuring that all Christians have one calendar. And indeed, my concern is to ensure that my Church, the UGCC, has one calendar. From a pastoral point of view, what is going on in my eparchy up here alone is . . . ridiculous.
Again, this is the let's all follow the way we know to be incorrect so that we can then all be abandoning I_Necaea's directive together. This excuse is starting to sound more and more like a Neville Chamberlain, "peace for our time" solution.

Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
Your point about defending the use of the Gregorian calendar even on the basis of the early ecumenical councils etc. would fall on deaf ears among the UGCC old calendarists - so we can forget about it.
So even the "ecumenical councils etc." don't matter and fall before "UGCC old calendarists"? If true this boarders on if it isn't already shear fanaticism. What has caused and nurtured this ... what should one call it?

Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
Remember, you belong to a Church that follows the Gregorian calendar - I don't believe you have any parishes that are with old calenar zealots (?).
I understand there is a pastoral problem. What, who caused it?

Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
The old calendar issue goes well beyond several pastoral points raised here and includes issues that do not, today, concern the BCC.
If you went into an old calendar parish of the UGCC saying what you wrote above . . . they would have you for after-Liturgy brunch . . . grin
And without salt . . .
Why? What was untrue in what I said? Why can't such a parish discern the truth and then act in accordance with the truth? If this attitude is in the mind and soul of the people then the pastoral problem is more -- much more -- than just choice of a calendar.

Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
I know you temper your position with a pastoral perspective. But your pastoral perspective, shaped by your BCC experience, is woefully inadequate to deal with the cultural, political and other issues that the BCC is quite innocent of.
My attitude is not really shaped by my BCC experience. I get what you're saying: a church has dug and now finds itself in a "cultural, political and other issues" hole. What put them there? Is propagating a falsehood about the calendar going to get them out? Those in the pit who just look around at themselves and the situation aren't going to find the a remedy for which one must look up, instead, to see the light.

ajk #414664 01/25/16 10:48 PM
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Dear Fr. Deacon,

I suppose your issue is that you are a natural scientist and, after repeated attempts, continue to come back to the same positivistic a priori's that characterize your approach.

The "truth?" Are you kidding? Call old calendnarists fanatics all you like. They are not fanatics because, in fact, they do accept the Gregorian calendar as such, but believe, rightly or wrongly, that the Julian calendar is and should be the internal "Church calendar."

Your pastoral approach in this matter really, well, stinks. You have no pastoral approach worth a dam here. And I'm speaking as someone who wants the new calendar.

You are unable to see the "truth" of things which cannot be proven scientifically. That is the limitation of the natural science approach, the approach of positivism.

We are talking past each other. Whatever.

Alex

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Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
Dear Fr. Deacon,

I suppose your issue is that you are a natural scientist and, after repeated attempts, continue to come back to the same positivistic a priori's that characterize your approach.
You don't have to be a rocket scientist to understand first day of spring, full moon, then the next Sunday is Pascha. Is the prescription of I_Nicaea also just some "positivistic a priori's"? What I keep coming back to is the wisdom of the Council's prescription and that those who claim they acknowledge and venerate that Council should do in deed what they say in words.

Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
The "truth?" Are you kidding? Call old calendnarists fanatics all you like. They are not fanatics because, in fact, they do accept the Gregorian calendar as such, but believe, rightly or wrongly, that the Julian calendar is and should be the internal "Church calendar."
I'm not kidding. You must also stop making up what I say. I said there are "calendar zealots." And when I respond to your characterizations I often find I must begin with the words if true (vide infra).

Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
Your pastoral approach in this matter really, well, stinks. You have no pastoral approach worth a dam here. And I'm speaking as someone who wants the new calendar.
As a beaver myself and on behalf of all beavers I resent your dismissive presumption. My pastoral approach is worth such a -- beaver -- dam: well-econstructed and functional and restraining the cataclysm of ineptitude.

Also, it is you who have stated that a segment of the UGCC would not care if its conviction about the calendar -- and where did they get that conviction?-- went against "early ecumenical councils etc." and words of the clergy in accord with that Council. If true then I'm not the one with a questionable "pastoral approach in this matter." I remind you of what you wrote and my response:

Originally Posted by ajk
Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
Your point about defending the use of the Gregorian calendar even on the basis of the early ecumenical councils etc. would fall on deaf ears among the UGCC old calendarists - so we can forget about it.
So even the "ecumenical councils etc." don't matter and fall before "UGCC old calendarists"? If true this boarders on if it isn't already shear fanaticism. What has caused and nurtured this ... what should one call it?


Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
You are unable to see the "truth" of things which cannot be proven scientifically. That is the limitation of the natural science approach, the approach of positivism.
I'm amazed you have the gall to concluded something so foolish and then put it on a forum. I sing the Creed at every Divine Liturgy. So of course I 'see the "truth" of things which cannot be proven scientifically.' Unlike those you commiserate with about the calendar (as you describe them), I also see the truth in things that can be adequately demonstrated scientifically, a realm of the "things visible" as I also sing.

Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
We are talking past each other. Whatever.

Alex
I understand what you say but simply disagreed mostly and respond accordingly.

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The Julian calendar was created with the work of astronomers who did, in fact, observe the stars, seasons, etc. with their senses and calculated accordingly. They observed natural phenomena- granted, not from a positivist viewpoint but through the lens of their Platonic-Aristotelian cosmology. Natural phenomena can't lead us to contemplation of immaterial reality of we ignore them. The connection of Easter with the natural spring is a major symbolic conjunction and departing from that puts us out of touch with tradition. I think all Orthodox churches should do what the Church of Finland did and simply adopt the Gregorian calendar or some variant of it for all festal dates.

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Dear Father Deacon,

I'm still trying to understand your pastoral approach and what you said about your theological faith is not about that at all. I'm taking this from a far simpler, mundane social science perspective.

But I've clearly offended you, made you upset at me, and have obviously revealed my woeful ignorance and incapacity to understand the "truth" wink

I believe we are both now making characterizations of each other's positions so I will excuse myself from this discussion on the grounds that it is inappropriate for me to argue or be too cute with an ordained clergyman.

Let me give an example of what I mean here. Our parish of St Demetrius is on the Gregorian calendar, but with an influx of immigrants from Ukraine who have become members and who are on the Julian calendar - the celebration of Julian calendar feasts have been introduced. That makes for an interesting liturgical life, to be sure. But everyone is happy and Father knows how to make and keep everyone happy.

The science behind any of that does not, and won't, enter the picture. And I too now celebrate both Christmases to keep everyone in my family happy. I wish we had only one, but we don't.

Keeping everyone together and happy as much as possible is more important than preaching to them about scientific truths - which preaching will fall on deaf ears anyway because the old calendarists regard the Julian calendar as the "church calendar" so discrepancies/inaccuracies don't disturb anyone nor is it an issue.

This is also what I mean by how your experience in the BCC has influenced, not your scientific understanding of the issue, but the pastoral/cultural context of it.

Perhaps this is a discussion to be better had over coffee rather than computers. I apologise for being too agressive or unadvised with my words - I do tend to be that way.

If you don't believe, just ask the Administrator, or Alice, or Bob/Theophan or Swan or Recluse or Michael Thomas ... smile

Feel free to let me have it as I won't come back here to read about it! wink

Alex

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Originally Posted by Orthodox Catholic
...it is inappropriate for me to argue or be too cute with an ordained clergyman.
... But everyone is happy and Father knows how to make and keep everyone happy.
...
Keeping everyone together and happy as much as possible is more important than preaching to them about scientific truths - which preaching will fall on deaf ears anyway because the old calendarists regard the Julian calendar as the "church calendar" so discrepancies/inaccuracies don't disturb anyone nor is it an issue.
...
Feel free to let me have it as I won't come back here to read about it! wink
All may and should argue valid points with anyone, as did Job. I don't stick my nose in the chosen pastoral solution, it's not mine to do so and I'm not in the middle of it, and I'm fond of my nose. But I do question it from the outside as I try to be an objective observer. And so I ask -- it being raised and presented by others -- and continue to ask the same unanswered questions as to what caused the pastoral situation especially as described here wherein a parish is kept happy by observing two Christmases and Paschas each year, thus creating a microcosm of the very lack of unity that all say is the first priority. Lack of unity but a happy solution -- for such then Nicaea_I's (effective) dictum should just have been "Is everybody happy?"

Denigrating scientific truths is demeaning for religion which, in its proper way, is the guardian of all truth, divine and human. But the question of the calendar is not about scientific truths. Astronomy and celestial mechanics are just the tools, the proper tools for the calendar question, developed by the God-given human intellect. No apology is in order when using them to their proper end.

So I say this about the pastoral situation described and this whole approach of ignore the data, make unfounded claims about the Julian methodology, then readily dismiss those claims when they are found to apply to the Gregorian instead, insist on following the approach that is in error rather than the accurate one as the solution: THERE IS NO JULIAN CALENDAR GENE. There is always a choice, for some easy for some hard perhaps, but one must strive to chose wisely. Julian calendar-jingoism has been and is bred not born; that's the root of the pastoral problem.





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Originally Posted by SwanOfEndlessTales
The connection of Easter with the natural spring is a major symbolic conjunction and departing from that puts us out of touch with tradition.
Very true. The presumably intended "symbolic conjunction" is not only with the spring but also its (full) moon and the following Sunday -- i.e. the first day of the new creation -- and thus it being a conjunction with the historical Resurrection itself.

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I wrote an article about this for the February issue of The New Star, the eparchial newspaper of the UGCC Eparchy of St. Nicholas in Chicago. There are some churches in that eparchy that celebrate according to both calendars. I don't know what it would take to reach common ground. Gregorian, Julian, revised Julian observances in the same eparchy are not promoting unity. Byzantine Catholics need to be unified before we can ever hope to obtain unity with our Orthodox counterparts. Lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi.

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Originally Posted by Dr. Henry P.
I wrote an article about this for the February issue of The New Star, the eparchial newspaper of the UGCC Eparchy of St. Nicholas in Chicago. There are some churches in that eparchy that celebrate according to both calendars. I don't know what it would take to reach common ground. Gregorian, Julian, revised Julian observances in the same eparchy are not promoting unity. Byzantine Catholics need to be unified before we can ever hope to obtain unity with our Orthodox counterparts. Lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi.

There is no unity, or so it seems to me. In addition, I fail to see the importance of celebrating Easter with neo-pagan churches that barely believe in it in the first place. This calendar obsession is neither the most significant, nor the only, decree or statement from Nicaea that is widely ignored today. We have much, much bigger problems than this.

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Dear Dr. Henry P.,

I would love to read your article!

When the UOC-KP Patriarch was in Chicago and saw a UGCC parish (Sts Volodymyr and Olha) celebrating on the Old Calendar and then another on the New Calendar, he told the press that "I would never want this to happen in our Orthodox Church."

He also said he would be willing to move to the Gregorian calendar (tomorrow) but that a lot of Ukrainian Orthodox would be against it and this could cause a schism. He said in the days of the Soviet Union when December 25 was imposed, the churches were empty and people still followed the old calendar (save for the celebration of New Year's Day on January 1st).

The Assyrian Church of the East now has two patriarchates which are divided SOLELY on the basis of the calendar . . .

And to Charles' point that this is insignicant - I wish I could agree with him, but no.

All my life the Julian calendar was ingrained in me as the "Ukrainian calendar" and the badge of Ukrainian identity. My father insisted we take January 7, 8 and 9 off as the three days of the Nativity, then January 14th as New Year's Day and the Naming of Christ, then January 19th for the Theophany.

Even when the younger members of my family "force the issue" and try to move the celebrations to December 24th and 25th, the "pull" of habit and tradition leads to the fuller celebrations in January. As you know, the new year's dances called "Malankas" (in honour of St Melanie of Rome whose feast is celebrated on Dec. 31st/January 13th) are practically held every weekend in January following the feast of the Nativity.

Several have even told me, "Even if Ukraine moves to the new calendar, we will never!"

And one may argue, as ajk has so coherently done here, about the reasons why we should be on the Gregorian calendar. That will fall on deaf ears for the most part in my eparchy (the Julian calendar is even more dear to those of the UGCC in Quebec which is an RC province and so the conditions are recreated there that obtained in western Ukraine when it is under RC political control . . .).

Suffice it to say that this issue is most significant but for reasons that are not evident to those who don't acknowledge them as valid.

There is also another reason why the Julian calendar is even making a stronger comeback up here - and I don't mean the influx of new immigrants from Ukraine, although that is a factor certainly.

I have friends whose families adopted the Gregorian calendar years ago and now that their parents have reposed, they have moved over to old calendar parishes.

Why you may ask? It is, they say, for spiritual reasons. To celebrate the major feasts on the Old Calendar brings, they say, a greater spiritual depth to them. The commercialism of Christmas is gone by that time, they say. They have to make a real commitment to get off work to attend ALL the Church services, which they do and they also fast in preparation for the feasts, go to the Mystery of Confession etc.

They say the Old Calendar helps them live a life of true spiritual zeal - and I can't argue with them about that. They are zealous and since I've been associating with them, they are always inspecting me to make sure I'm fasting properly, including the Wednesday and Friday fasts smile .

In short, these UGCC die-hards remind me of the example of our Recluse here grin .

I can think of many worse things to befall me!

Alex

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And to Charles' point that this is insignicant - I wish I could agree with him, but no.

Not necessarily insignificant, but not our biggest problem. My issue with the whole calendar thing is as follows. There seems some kind of burning desire to celebrate a common date for Easter with ultra-liberal Protestant churches. Celebrate the risen Lord? I am not convinced some of those churches even worship the same God we worship.

If, on the other hand, Catholicism and Orthodoxy could agree on a common date, that would be fine. Both churches have sacraments, orders, and a core of doctrines that are similar. Celebrating Easter together makes much more sense between churches that agree on what Easter is.

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OK Charles, you are right - as you always are!

Doesn't it get boring for you after awhile? grin

Alex

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grin Too funny!

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Here is a traditionalist Orthodox website with a whole series of articles defending the Julian calendar - should make for an interesting read all around. Perhaps Fr. Deacon ajk could have a look at a couple of these and give his estimation here:

http://orthodoxinfo.com/ecumenism/ea_calendar.aspx

Alex

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My contribution may be totally irrelevant, but here goes...Why this burning desire to share the date of Pascha with a (Western) Church (or churches) whose observance of said feast is quite possibly the most anti-climactic thing I know of...in contradistinction to what any Eastern Orthodox or Catholic Church celebrates?
I probably have less at stake than any one here on this question, so I may be butting in, but at least try to see my view as an attempt at objectivity or an "outsider's opinion"

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