Easter in Romania

Important Days

• Easter Day is a public holiday across Romania and celebrates Jesus' resurrection from death, as told in the Christian bible. Romania's Easter holiday follows the Orthodox Easter date, which is often different from the Easter date determined by other Christian churches. What Do People Do? Easter is one of the most important religious celebrations in Romania. Many churches across Romania hold special Easter services.
• Millions of Orthodox Christians commemorate Good Friday, also known as "Great Friday" to remember the events leading up to Jesus' crucifixion. The Orthodox Easter dates usually differ from the dates used by western churches because most Orthodox churches retained some version of the Julian calendar, which is older than the Gregorian calendar, commonly used today.

The Resurrection itself is celebrated on the night before the Easter Day - this year the Orthodox Easter is on April 4th. The night before that people go to church to light the candle and bring the resurrection light into their homes. On their way back to their homes, people would share the holy candle fire with others. The belief is that each church gets light from God, with the main source being the holy fire in Jerusalem. This is a miracle which happens each year on resurrection - in the tomb where Jesus was buried, a flame bursts out of nowhere, after a priest says certain prayers. The holy fire is then spread throughout the world. The Romanian Orthodox Church has been bringing the holy fire to Romania too in the last couple of years.

Typical food

•Dyed Eggs- You can't have Easter without eating at least a couple of hard-boiled eggs.

•Roast lamb steak- Usually served with spring roasted vegetable, such as carrots, green beans, potatoes and green peas.

•Traditional sponge cake (cozonac)- A delicious sweet bread typically filled with walnuts and cocoa.

•Other foods many Romanians eat on Easter are the famous sarmale (minced meat in cabbage rolls) and boeuf salad.