most of the world has adopted the gregorian calendar and that was set up by pope gregory the thirteenth. fifteen eighty two but the julian calendar celebrates christmas eve on the sixth of january and christmas day on the seventh of january which is what we're seeing this evening now the gregorian christmas as we all know is preceded by advent well julian christmas is preceded by a forty day nativity fast it's called weather restrictions to what you can eat and that ends tonight families will enjoy a holy supper and that consists of twelve dishes to represent twelve apostles it really is a beautiful evening and inside the ceremony people can enjoy singing traditional hymns enjoying the atmosphere there and praying with their fellow orthodox christians and even though it's a very very long ceremony they say that is one of the most beautiful services that they will experience over the course of the. so it's christmas a celebration is occurring amid a deep crisis for the orthodox church a newly formed orthodox church of ukraine has been granted independence from the russian church just a f

by most western countries and the one that most of the world is familiar with now preceding the gregorian christmas christmas is advent and the julian christmas is preceded by a forty day nativity fast and that ends tonight where families will enjoy a holy supper where they will have twelve different dishes which represent the twelve apostles now if you look here again people are literally piling up outside this cathedral here they're taking photos there's lots of people inside and yeah it's a really one of the holiest nights of the year here where they can celebrate the birth of jesus like christians and non christians do all over the world on the twenty fifth of december. during soviet times of course the country was atheist but when religion was really adopted it was mainly to dogs christianity so a significant part of the russian population celebrate tonight. and there's a around one million people in moscow alone enjoying services across the city but it's not the majority of the population who consider new year's eve to be the most important day and that kicks off a ten day celebrati

birth of jesus christ but it's a different day celebrated here on january seventh according to the gregorian calendar let's cross to all commentators artie's done bushell a religious expert and then of read. they have live pictures of the service. and continue celebrating christmas and other feast quoting to they're all talented. and in their own countries they are called on calendars. so if we. get an back to the tradition of celebrating christmas. i could say that impression. that tradition very tradition of celebrating the coming of christ into the world was originated in the church of rome. it. was with us at least at the second century. we did not know the exact birthdays of jesus. traditionally they chose to celebrate it during this winter solstice on december twentieth. it came to the east much later very holiday of the nativity of christ came to the east much later and in the east we had a festival feast which was called it be funny and. we were celebrated and then a teacher of christ and christ baptist together on a single day. was. this tradition of celebrating christmas came to us