Christianity 003: What is the Church New Year?

September 1/14

September 1 on the Julian Calendar (14 on Gregorian and Revised Julian calendars) is the beginning of the Church New Year. First, let us dive a little bit into the history of this holiday before we discuss what it all means and whether celebrating it on September 1 or 14 makes any difference to anyone at all.

History

At first glance, it may appear that, historically speaking, this Church holy day has little to do with the Church. Indiction - the word that became translated as “new year” in relation to the Church observance - was the beginning of an imperial taxation period in the Roman Empire. The period, or the whole indiction, lasted fifteen years - at least, for some time in the fourth century which was formative in the history of the Church. Emperor Constantine set the date of the start of the indiction in 312 AD on September 1 according to the Julian calendar, which in 2024 falls on September 14 according to the Gregorian calendar - that is to say, today. The reason for choosing September was simple - the harvest was usually all gathered by that time, and it was possible to calculate and collect taxes. Curiously, albeit, likely not directly related, the U.S. government’s fiscal year begins on October 1. The Church, however, did not develop many of its liturgical practices of marking the new year until sometime after the decrees of Justinian I mandating references to the date of the indiction in all documents and thus eventually establishing it as the date of the beginning of the year throughout the empire.

There was, however, an older Jewish tradition of marking the beginning