Spring Equinox Linked to Religious Celebrations

(CANVAS STAFF REPORTS) - The spring equinox has been tied to religious rites since ancient times.

The spring equinox, which falls between March 19 and 21, is one of two days of the year when daytime and nighttime are both about 12 hours long. ReligiousTolerance.org states that the spring equinox and the winter equinox, which happens in September, both have strong ties to ancient and modern religious celebrations.

ReligiousTolerance writes that many Pagan religions in the ancient Mediterranean region had a major seasonal day-long religious celebration at or near the spring equinox.

In the religion of Cybele the Phyrgian fertility goddess had a partner believed to have been born "via a virgin birth." The consort was Attis, said to have died and been resurrected each year between March 22 and 25, when the vernal or spring equinox fell in the Julian calendar.

Early Christians would celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ around the same time. Easter Sunday now falls between March 22 and April 25. The Roman Catholic Church and Protestant denominations celebrate it on the first Sunday after the first full moon after March 20.

Schooloftheseasons.com remarks that the month of March contains holidays dedicated to the mother goddesses, including Astarte, Isis, Aphrodite, Cybele and the Virgin Mary.

The site suggests a variety of ways to celebrate spring, including a spring feast, painting eggs, decorating objects with the colors of red, which represents the blood of sacrifice and life, and green, the growth of the plants, and blessing and planting seeds.