PREVIOUS THOUGHTS FOR THE DAY
March 25th to March 30th 2002
MONDAY MARCH 25
Formulating Easter
It's a Full Moon week... again. It's amazing how fast they come around. You can set your clock - or your calendar by them. Indeed, that's precisely what the ancients used to do. Even in this modern age the date of Easter is still set by the Lunar calendar. That's why it is happening so much earlier this year than it did last year. Well, actually, the day of Easter is chosen by the movement of the Moon plus a secret formula that you have to be a rocket scientist to understand and over which there have been countless historical arguments. But anyway, the Full Moon has something to do with it. It also has something to do with the reason why so many people are likely to find this a rather exciting week.
TUESDAY MARCH 26
Timing
Timing is at the essence of everything. People in my profession have found, through long experience, that although developments on Earth coincide with symbolic events in the Heavens, the coincidence is never exact. Sometimes there will be a delayed impact. Usually though, things will start to happen a little before the astrologically allotted hour. The most potent period is just prior to a planetary alignment. For example, once the Moon has become completely full on Thursday its influence will rapidly start to diminish. It is now, today, that Full Moon fever is at its most ferocious.
WEDNESDAY MARCH 27
Greek Orthodox Easter
"Hello Jonathan, I am a Greek Orthodox priest serving a parish in Monessen, Pennsylvania. I have long enjoyed your work and I noticed your remarks, on Monday, about the date of Easter. We in the Orthodox church observe "Pascha" (The Resurrection of our Lord and Savior). Our date for this is based on a decree of the Ecumenical Council of Nicea, Asia Minor, held in the year 325 A.D. under Constantine the Great. This says that Easter must be celebrated on the Sunday following the first full moon of the vernal equinox...but always after the Hebrew Passover to maintain the Biblical sequence of events of the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. This year, we shall celebrate Easter on May 5th. There ARE times that the date of Easter coincides with that of the Western Christian Churches. But this is not one of them. I wish you and your readers a Blessed and Joyous "Pascha"! Hieromonk Joachim (Pantelis)"
THURSDAY MARCH 28
Festivals at Full Moon
I wonder whether religions hold their festivals at Full Moon because it feeds fervour? It is now the Hindu festival of Holi, the Jewish festival of Pesach and the Christian festival of Easter. Though the Greek Orthodox Church wont be celebrating their Easter till May 5, today�s Full Moon is still part of the calculation that leads them to that date. Meanwhile Jili Hamilton of Geneva reminds us that Easter was originally a celebration of the fertility Goddess, Eostre. It is from this that we get the word oestrogen. "The Church," she says, "hi-jacked her event as they did with the dates of many other traditional festivals, notably Christmas."
FRIDAY MARCH 29
Goddess Eostre plus Astronews with Yasmin Boland
The Moon was full last night - and for many people this is a holiday. So I shall try to speak softly and slowly (if your headache is really bad try vitamin C.) I have had many e-mails from readers keen to point out that Eostre or Eastre was the Anglo Saxon Goddess of spring. Her Teutonic name is Ostara - which means movement towards the rising sun. Ironically, the Christians turned her festival of the rising sun to a festival about their own rising son! Eggs, by the way, are an ancient fertility symbol, associated with spring - and the cross on a hot cross bun is equilateral. This is an image with proud Pagan roots. It suggests the four equal quarters of the year.Click here for Astro News with an article by Yasmin Boland on the astrological love profile of Nicole Kidman.
SATURDAY MARCH 30
Match Made in Heaven? Calista Flockhart & Harrison Ford
A trine is not just an Australian locomotive. It is also an angle of 120 degrees between two planets. This week Saturn and Neptune form a trine. This is good news for anyone who is hoping to turn a dream into a reality.
The Match Made in Heaven?
Harrison Ford born July 13 1942 - Cancer
Calista Flockhart born November 11 1964 - Scorpio
In theory, this relationship has got everything going for it. He's a Cancerian, she's a Scorpio and these two signs are famously compatible. In practice? Well, I have my doubts - not because of the age difference but because of other awkward alignments between their full horoscopes. But this is undoubtedly an affinity. A friendship, even a very special relationship. I just doubt that it will ever be much of a marriage.
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