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Merry Christmas, old calendar says

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  • Merry Christmas, old calendar says

    New York Daily News, NY
    Jan 8 2005

    Merry Christmas, old calendar says


    Viken Markarian and his brother Vasken were given money, clothing and
    gift bags on Dec. 25, and later that day, the family sat down to a
    turkey dinner with all the traditional trimmings.
    But, strictly speaking, they were not celebrating Christmas. Their
    Christmas was two days ago - and there were no presents.

    Viken, 19, and Vasken, 14, and their parents, who live in Jackson
    Heights, Queens, are Armenian. They celebrate Christmas on Jan. 6, a
    date dictated by the old Julian calendar.

    "It sounds crazy to some of my friends," Viken said after services
    Wednesday night at the St. Vartan Armenian Cathedral, on the East
    Side of Manhattan. "But, it's our way."

    The calendar that set Dec. 25 as Christmas is called the Gregorian
    calendar because it was adopted during the reign of Pope Gregory XIII
    in the late 16th century. It replaced the Julian calendar, named for
    Julius Caesar, which incorrectly gave each year an extra 11-1/2
    minutes and thus made the dates for Easter and other important
    Christian holidays increasingly inaccurate.

    Most of the Christian world quickly adopted the Gregorian calendar,
    but some ethnic or national Orthodox churches, as well as the
    Armenian Church of America, still honor the old Julian calendar for
    traditional liturgical reasons - after all, they argue, it was the
    one in use when most Christian dogma was formulated.

    "At least we're not the only ones out of step," one usher at St.
    Vartan said. "Ukrainians, Bulgarians, Romanians, you name it - their
    Christmas is Jan. 6, too."

    Still, contemporary cultural influences are so strong that even
    old-calendar Christians who do not celebrate Dec. 25 as the birth
    date of Jesus often exchange gifts on that day. In some cases, there
    are gifts on Jan. 6, although this is by no means established
    tradition.

    "We've already had our Christmas," Vasken said. "We're not going to
    get anything else." But Jan. 6 is still a special day for the
    Armenian community.

    There are about 1 million members of the Armenian Church of America
    in the United States and Canada, with metropolitan New York home to
    the largest single community. This does not include members of the
    Armenian Catholic Church, which is allied with Rome and observes
    Christmas on Dec. 25.

    "For us, Christmas is not exclusively a religious holiday," said the
    Rev. Mardiros Chevian, dean (administrator) of St. Vartan for the
    past dozen years. "It's also a family and community holiday."

    It was Chevian who led the liturgically elaborate Christmas Eve
    services Wednesday, while his superior, Archbishop Khajag Barsamian,
    spiritual leader of Armenians living everywhere in the United States
    except California, Washington, Arizona and Nevada, celebrated the
    Christmas Day service Thursday that traditionally ends with the
    triumphant proclamation "Christ is born and revealed."

    At the Christmas Eve service, 40 robed teenagers read scriptural
    passages before Chevian, a Rhode Islander who was ordained 20 years
    ago at St. Vartan, led the hour-long Mass, assisted by six deacons
    and a choir singing in Armenian.

    After the service, Chevian said that it was impossible for the
    congregation - or himself - to ignore the traditional trappings of
    the "other Christian" denomination that celebrated Dec. 25.

    "Look at that," he said, pointing to a tall, impressively decorated
    Christmas tree standing outside the main entrance to the sanctuary.
    "It's not Armenian, but we recognize the reality of where we are."
    There also were heaps of poinsettias around the altar, another
    seasonal touch with no basis in Armenian tradition.

    He also displayed a letter he had written to school superintendents
    or principals, asking them to allow their Armenian students to skip
    classes on Jan. 6 to observe the Christmas holiday. "They usually
    excuse our students," Chevian said. "New Yorkers know about other
    people's holidays."

    In turn, St. Vartan frequently plays host to non-Armenian tour
    groups, many of them from public schools. About 100 are scheduled to
    visit in the next week or so. "We'll show them around and tell them
    some stories, then give them some Armenian pastry," Chevian said.

    How about exchanges of greetings?

    "No problem," Viken said. "They say, 'Merry Christmas.' We say,
    'Shnorhavor soorp dznoont.'"
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