The Ides of March

March 15, 2016 Tuesday)
March 15 is also known as “The Ides of March.” We remember that phrase from our high school days when we studied the final speech of Julius Caesar.
In the play, a character says, “Beware the Ides of March.” It was a warning about an assassination plot that was carried out that day.
“The Ides of March” was the ancient Roman way of saying “March 15.” Here is the explanation from the Wikipedia Online Encyclopedia: “The Romans did not number days of a month sequentially from the first through the last day. Instead, they counted back from three fixed points of the month: the Nones (5th or 7th, depending on the length of the month), the Ides (13th or 15th), and the Kalends (1st of the following month). The Ides occurred near the midpoint, on the 13th for most months, but on the 15th for March, May, July, and October. The Ides were supposed to be determined by the full moon, reflecting the lunar origin of the Roman calendar. On the earliest calendar, the Ides of March would have been the first full moon of the new year.”
No wonder they eventually replaced that calendar with the one we use now.
Ever wonder why Easter is on a different day every year? Well, here’s an answer: Easter falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon following the Vernal Equinox. Fortunately for us, we don’t have to compute that; we just look at the calendar. This year it is on March 27, which we consider to be an early Easter.

The importance of Easter is not its date but its meaning. The word, “Easter,” is from other origins and a better designation would be “Resurrection Sunday.” Every Sunday, however, is “Resurrection Sunday” for Christians. Christ rose from the dead on Sunday. The first Christians were mostly Jews, and they continued to worship on Saturday but they also worshiped on the first day of the week, Sunday. As the message spread to non-Jews, Sunday became their only day of formal worship.
A church is made up of people who disperse throughout the week and who can be found in many places experiencing a variety of activities, but once a week the church gets together in one place for worship. What if all the members showed up for worship? Where would we put them all? That would be a wonderful problem for us.