The Southern Hemisphere

As the church is moving to a new translation of its liturgical language, it would also seem prudent at some point to address the calendar and other liturgical issues that face the rest of the world. For instance, the liturgical language holds a northern hemisphere bias. The church asks us to keep the Passover on the first full moon following the spring equinox, but the southern hemisphere is not allowed to do that. They must hold fast to the northern hemisphere's solar and lunar calendar. This also affects some of the movable holidays like Christmas, which had taken over the ancient northern European pagan custom of worshiping the return of the sun. Christmas is held by Christians as the victory of light over darkness, but in the southern hemisphere daylight decreases after December 25th. Just like with the feast the celebrates the Birth of John the Baptist, who must decrease so Christ can increase. Light increases in the southern hemisphere after June 25th! Oh, it would be good to respect the conditions of our brothers and sisters who are asked to conform to our calendar.