Russian Orthodox Church to mark Christ's resurrection April 15

The Russian Orthodox Church is going to mark the Resurrection of Christ, which is its most important religious holiday, April 15. The church tradition implies that Christ's resurrection heralds a victory over sin and death, as well as the incipient existence of a new world that has been atoned for by Christ, and which has also been blessed by him. Sorrow is thus replaced by joy. Christ was crucified on Good Friday, suffering for mankind's sins. Christ remained inside his sepulchre on Maundy Saturday, what with his soul descending into Hell and freeing the souls of Old-Testament prophets. After that, Christ rose from the dead on Easter Sunday. The holy fire is miraculously ignited on each Maundy Saturday inside Jerusalem's Holy Sepulchre cave. All Orthodox churches hold particularly solemn services and religious processions in the early hours of every Easter Sunday, thus ushering in a 50-day Easter cycle. Ascension Day is celebrated on the 40-th day of each Easter cycle, which ends with St. Trinity Day, or the Descent of the Holy Ghost Upon the Apostles. St. Trinity Day also heralds the birth of the worldly church. The Resurrection of Christ is often referred to as Easter, which means "deliverance" or "exodus" in ancient Hebrew. Judaism celebrates Passover in commemoration of the deliverance of the Jews from Egyptian slavery and the crossing of the Red Sea by them. Meanwhile Christianity perceives Easter as the exodus of human life from the dead toward its beginning, e.g. eternal life, through the Resurrection of Christ. This year, all Christians using Gregorian and Julian calendars will be celebrating Easter April 15. Well, this is an extremely rare occurrence because, due to different calendars, Easter Day is usually marked by the world's Christians with a deviation of up to several weeks.

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