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• • Advent: Begins on the 4th sunday before christmas. Marks the start of the christian church’s year. Christians use this period to prepare for Christmas. In churches and chapels one candle is lit on each of the 4 sundays during advent. Advent means “coming” or “drawing near”. 
• • Christmas: The celebration of the birth of Jesus, held on December 25th. This date was chosen because Jesus was believed to have been conceived and to have died on the same day of the year, on March 25th, and then born exactly 9 months later. In the Orthodox church Christmas is on January 7th. The story of the birth of Jesus is read in churches, and carols, which are hymns about his birth, are sung. 
• • Lent: The period before Easter when Christians remember their sins. Used to be a time of fasting, but today people are more likely to just give up one thing they enjoy. Commemorates the 40 days and nights that Jesus spent fasting in the wilderness. 
• • Shrove Tuesday/Mardi Gras/Pancake Day: The day before Lent. A time of celebration before Lent begins. There are usually parades, and in some countries people make pancakes as a way to use up food before the fasting period. 
• • Ash Wednesday: Some Christians mark their foreheads with ash, as a sign that they are humble before God. A symbol of sorrow and mourning caused by sin. 
• • Holy week: Christians remember the events from the arrival of Jesus in Jerusalem to te day of his resurrection on Easter Day.
  • Palm Sunday: The sunday before Easter. Marks the beginning of the Holy Week. Many Christians are given a cross made of leaves in memory of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. 
  • Good Friday: The day when people remember the death of Jesus. Christians believe that allowing himself to be crucified was an act of supreme goodness for all. 
• • Easter: Most important Christian festival. Special church services are held. Commemorates the resurrection of Jesus from the dead 3 days after his crucifixion. The date is moveable, but always happens on a sunday in spring. 
• • Ascension Day: Christians remember the ascension of Jesus into heaven. Celebrated on the 40th day of Easter. 
• Pentecost: Seven sundays after easter. Marks fifty days after the resurrection, when God’s Holy Spirit is said to have come down to the disciples in the form of wind and fire. All Christians were traditionally baptized at Pentecost.
• • Rosh Hashanah: Begins in the month of Tishri (around september or october). Celebrated with a 2 day festival. It is believed that on the first year God created the world and humans, and that God judges everyone at this time, and decides what will happen to them the next year.
  • Jews eat sweet foods, which represents their wish for a sweet year ahead. 
  • Begins a 10 day period of atonement, during which people pray, give to charity and ask for forgiveness to try and influence God’s judgement and make the next year better. 
• • Yom Kippur (or The Day of Atonement): The most sacred day in the year. Services are held continuously from morning to evening, which include readings from the tenakh and prayer. Jews also seek forgiveness from the people which they have wronged during the year. 
  • Certain things like eating and drinking (only for adults which are not sick), washing or putting perfume or oil on their skin, and wearing any kind of leather is forbidden, to help Jews to focus on their spirit on this day.
• Passover/Pesach


  Held in March or April, lasts for 8 days, marks the escape of the Israelites from Egypt where they were kept under slavery
• Jews believe that on the night before the escape, the angel of death passed over the houses of the Israelites while killing the eldest son of each Egyptian family
• Passover services

  1. Held in the synagogue

  2. Main ceremony held at home

  3. Spring cleaning done to get rid of all traces of bread made of yeast

  4. Sedar held
• • Seder: Includes a meal in which some of the food and drink has special meaning (for example: apples, nuts, wine and cinnamon symbolize the bricks used by the Israelites to build Egyptian houses, and horseradish is a reminder of the misery of the slaves). 

     -  The most important part of Seder is when a child asks why this specific night is different from the others, and the story pf the Exodus from Egypt is read from a special prayer book named Haggadah. 
• • Sukkot: Jews spend time living in temporary dwellings, called Sukkot, made of wood and leaves. 
  • In remembrance of when the Israelites were wandering in the wilderness.
• • Shavuot: Celebrates the giving of the ten commandments to Moses. Jews stay up all night studying the Torah. Happens between may and june. 
• • Hanukkah or the Festival of Lights: Held in November or December, and lasts for 8 days. 
  • Celebrates the Jewish rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem in 164BCE, after it was wrecked and made unholy by greek invaders. 
  • Each household lights a 9 branched candle stick called a Shamash (or servant candle), is used to light the others, 1 on the first night, 2 on the second, and so on until all 8 are burning. 3 blessings are also recited when the candle is lit.