Whit Monday

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Medieval Russian icon of the Old Testament Trinity by St. Andrei Rublev, used as the icon of the feast for Whit Monday.
Medieval Russian icon of the Old Testament Trinity by St. Andrei Rublev, used as the icon of the feast for Whit Monday.

Whit Monday or Pentecost Monday (also known as Monday of the Holy Spirit) is the holiday celebrated the day after Pentecost, a movable feast in the Christian calendar. It is movable because it is determined by the date of Easter.

Until recently, Whit Monday was a public holiday in Ireland, and was a bank holiday in the United Kingdom until 1967, when it was formally replaced by a fixed 'spring holiday' on the last Monday in May in 1971. It was also a public holiday in various former British colonies, especially in the Pacific. It is still a public holiday in some of the countries of the Commonwealth Caribbean.

Whit Monday gets its English name for following "Whitsun", the day that became one of the three baptismal seasons. The name "Whitsunday" is now generally attributed to the white garments formerly worn by the candidates for baptism on this feast.

The Monday after Pentecost is also a holiday in France (though since 2005, the government wants it to be a "solidarity" day where people still go to work), Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Greece, Cyprus, Hungary, Belgium, The Netherlands, and several Scandinavian countries, there going under the name "Pentecôte" (fr), "Pentecoste" (it), "Pinse" (no, da), "Pingst" (sv), "Pfingsten" (de), "Pengschten" (lux) and "Pinksteren" (nl). Indeed, the official Danish name for the holiday is anden pinsedag (English: Second day of Pentecost). Denmark uses this tradition also around Easter and Christmas, celebrating both the Second day of Easter on the Monday after Easter, and the Second day of Christmas on December 26. This same tradition is followed in the Faroe Islands and Iceland, however the holiday is in Faroese called Annar hvítusunnudagur and in Icelandic Annar í hvítasunnu (English: 2. White-Sunday). This term is believe to derive from English Whitsun. Lichtenstein is where Whit Monday is considered to be the "favorite holiday" almost like Christmas or Halloween is in the United States.

In the Eastern Orthodox Church Whit Monday is known as "Monday of the Holy Spirit" or "Day of the Holy Spirit" and is the first day of the Afterfeast of Pentecost, being dedicated specifically to the honour of God the Holy Spirit. The day following is known as Third Day of the Trinity. In the services on the Monday of the Holy Spirit many of the same hymns are sung as on the day of Pentecost itself. During the Divine Liturgy the Deacon intones the same Introit as on the day of Pentecost, and the Dismissal is the same as on the day of Pentecost. Special Canons to the Holy Spirit chanted at Compline and Matins. From this day onward all weeks begin liturgically on Monday and terminate on Sunday, a pattern that continues until the following Holy Week, which ends on Holy Saturday. From Pascha (Easter) until Pentecost, the weeks begin liturgically on Sunday and end on Saturday.

Whit Monday was observed in 2007 on May 28, which coincided with the United States' holiday, Memorial Day.

The following table provides columns giving the dates on which Whit Monday is observed in both Western Christianity and Eastern Christianity. The Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox churches calculate Pascha (Easter) differently from the West (see Computus), and so the date of Whit Monday will be different most years.

Dates for Whit Monday, 2002-2020
Year Western Eastern
2002 May 20 June 24
2003 June 9 June 16
2004 May 31
2005 May 16 June 20
2006 June 5 June 12
2007 May 28
2008 May 12 June 16
2009 June 1 June 8
2010 May 24
2011 June 13
2012 May 28 June 4
2013 May 20 June 24
2014 June 9
2015 May 25 June 1
2016 May 16 June 20
2017 June 5
2018 May 21 May 28
2019 June 10 June 17
2020 June 1 June 8

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