The liturgical calendar, season by season
The liturgical calendar is how the Church marks time around the life of Christ. The year begins on the First Sunday of Advent and moves through Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Holy Week and Easter to Pentecost and the long season that follows, with saints' days and holy days along the way. Each season has its own color, readings and prayers.
The seasons of the Church year
- Advent: the four Sundays before Christmas, waiting for the coming of Christ (violet or blue)
- Christmas: twelve days, from 25 December to 5 January (white)
- Epiphany: from 6 January, the manifestation of Christ to the nations (white on the feast, then green)
- Lent: forty days from Ash Wednesday, a season of repentance and preparation (violet)
- Holy Week: from Palm Sunday to Holy Saturday, including the Sacred Triduum
- Easter: fifty days of celebration of the Resurrection (white or gold)
- Pentecost: the gift of the Holy Spirit (red)
- The season after Pentecost, also called Ordinary Time or the Sundays after Trinity (green)
Names, colors and some boundaries vary from one prayer book to another.
Why Easter moves
Easter falls on the Sunday after the first full moon on or after the spring equinox, using the Church's fixed tables rather than astronomy. That is why it can fall between 22 March and 25 April. Ash Wednesday, Ascension Day and Pentecost are counted from Easter and move with it.
Feasts, commemorations and precedence
Besides the seasons, the calendar marks principal feasts, holy days, and commemorations of saints and witnesses of the faith. When two of them fall on the same day, rules of precedence decide which one is observed and whether the other is transferred.
Each prayer book has its own calendar and its own rules. Ordo follows the rules of the book you choose and can show why a given day was set the way it was.
How the calendar shapes the office
The season changes the collect, the readings, some canticles and antiphons, and the liturgical color. Praying the Daily Office is one of the simplest ways to live the Church year day by day.
Frequently asked questions
When does the liturgical year begin?
On the First Sunday of Advent, the fourth Sunday before Christmas, usually at the end of November or the beginning of December.
What do the liturgical colors mean?
Violet or blue for preparation and repentance, white or gold for the great feasts of Christ, red for the Holy Spirit and the martyrs, and green for the ordinary time of growth.
Is the calendar the same in every Anglican church?
The main seasons are shared, but each prayer book sets its own feasts, commemorations, colors and rules of precedence.
Pray today's office
Ordo sets out today's office for the prayer book you choose. Free on iPhone, Android and the web.