Western Easter
Sunday, March 31, 2002
Gregorian computus. Golden number 8, epact 16, Paschal full moon March 28.
Easter 2002
Easter 2002: Sunday, March 31
In 2002 Western Easter, reckoned in the Gregorian calendar, falls on Sunday, March 31, 2002. Orthodox Easter (Pascha), reckoned in the Julian calendar, falls on Sunday, May 5, 2002, five weeks later.
Orthodox Easter
Sunday, May 5, 2002
Julian computus: April 22 in the Julian calendar, plus 13 days to reach the Gregorian calendar.
In 2002 the two Easters are 35 days apart: Orthodox Easter is five weeks after Western Easter. They last fell on the same day in 2001 (April 15). They next fall on the same day in 2004 (April 11).
Western · Mar 31
Orthodox · May 5
MarchAprilMayThe moving feasts of 2002
Western feasts, 2002
| Feast | Date | From Easter |
|---|---|---|
| Shrove Tuesday | Tuesday, February 12, 2002 | −47 days |
| Ash Wednesday | Wednesday, February 13, 2002 | −46 days |
| Palm Sunday | Sunday, March 24, 2002 | −7 days |
| Maundy Thursday | Thursday, March 28, 2002 | −3 days |
| Good Friday | Friday, March 29, 2002 | −2 days |
| Holy Saturday | Saturday, March 30, 2002 | −1 day |
| Easter Sunday | Sunday, March 31, 2002 | Easter Sunday |
| Easter Monday | Monday, April 1, 2002 | +1 day |
| Ascension Day | Thursday, May 9, 2002 | +39 days |
| Pentecost | Sunday, May 19, 2002 | +49 days |
Orthodox feasts, 2002
| Feast | Date | From Easter |
|---|---|---|
| Clean Monday | Monday, March 18, 2002 | −48 days |
| Palm Sunday | Sunday, April 28, 2002 | −7 days |
| Great and Holy Friday | Friday, May 3, 2002 | −2 days |
| Pascha (Easter Sunday) | Sunday, May 5, 2002 | Easter Sunday |
| Ascension | Thursday, June 13, 2002 | +39 days |
| Pentecost | Sunday, June 23, 2002 | +49 days |
Each date is Easter Sunday plus or minus a fixed number of days; the offsets and their sources are on the about page. Observance varies by church and by country. Whether a feast is a day off work is a matter of each country’s law: Holidays lists each country’s public holidays, off the open Nager.Date database.
How early is Easter in 2002?
March 31 is date 10 of the 35 that Western Easter can take, March 22 to April 25: 9 days after the earliest possible date and 25 days before the latest. Of the 201 Easters from 1900 to 2100, 36 fall on an earlier date than this one and 156 fall on a later date. 8 other years in that span share the date: 1907, 1918, 1929, 1991, 2013, 2024, 2086, 2097. Before 2002, Western Easter last fell on March 31 in 1991; after 2002 it next does in 2013.
In the 2000s Western Easter ran from March 23 (2008) to April 23 (2000); 2002’s March 31 is the third-earliest of the ten. Across the twenty-first century (2001–2100) Western Easter falls on March 31 in 5 years, and the Western and Orthodox Easters share a Sunday in 31 years.
Orthodox Easter on May 5 is April 22 in the Julian calendar; 13 days carry it to the Gregorian calendar in 2002. From 1900 to 2100 Orthodox Easter falls on an earlier Gregorian date in 188 years and on a later one in 6 years; it falls on the same date in 1907, 1918, 1929, 2013, 2024, 2097.
The earliest and latest Easters from 1900 to 2100, with how often each date occurs, are on their own page.
The arithmetic for 2002
8Golden number: the year’s place in the 19-year cycle of the moon, (2002 mod 19) + 1.
16Gregorian epact: the age of the reckoned moon at the start of the year.
March 28Paschal full moon of the Gregorian reckoning, a Thursday. Easter is the Sunday after it.
May 1Paschal full moon of the Julian reckoning in Gregorian dates (Julian April 18), a Wednesday.
The two algorithms, worked for 2002
- Western: the Anonymous Gregorian algorithm
a=7 b=20 c=2 d=5 e=0 f=1 g=6 h=7 i=0 k=2 l=2 m=0h + l − 7m + 114 = 123, and 123 ÷ 31 = 3 remainder 30: month 3, day 30 + 1. March 31- Orthodox: Meeus’s Julian algorithm
a=2 b=0 c=7 d=28 e=3d + e + 114 = 145, and 145 ÷ 31 = 4 remainder 21: Julian April 22. Plus 13 days: May 5
How the date of Easter is calculated explains each letter. The dates on this page agree with the US Census Bureau table (Western), the 5ko.free.fr tables (Western and Orthodox), each read September 28, 2026.