The exact term “high holy days” is particular to Judaism, in English anyway. But there are Catholic equivalents.
The week from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday is called Holy Week, which contains the Triduum.
Beginning the night of Holy Thursday (called Maundy Thursday in the Anglican tradition, after the word mandatum, commandment – it is the commemoration of the Last Supper, when Jesus gave his disciples a new commandment to “love one another”), through Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and Easter Sunday, is the holiest period of the liturgical year, this is the Triduum; because there are three nights.
Christmas is a Holy Day of Obligation (which only means you have to attend a Mass whether it falls on Sunday or not, along with a number of other celebrations which have not been secularized, included the Solemnity of Mary (January 1st), the Assumption (Mary is ‘assumed’ into heaven), The Immaculate Conception (Mary again – celebrating her being born without sin), the Ascension (Jesus ascends to heaven after Pentecost), All Saints (day after All Souls which is Halloween).
By the way, the solar/lunar formula that determines when Easter falls each year deliberately ensures that it does not coincide exactly with Passover.
When I told my wife about this thread and my response, she reminded me that the phrase, “Wish you well over the fast” is apparently British and we saw it on a sign in a restaurant in a restaurant in the east end of London called Blooms, that we ate in 55 years ago. But I have used it and I still think entirely appropriate.
I generally use “meaningful” when I am not sure of the nature of some holiday. (There is some kind of Chinese Cemetery holiday which friends observe and I still don’t know what the perceived function or mood is supposed to be. And I can never remember its official name.) “Meaningful” covers everything from Easter to Diwali to Yom Kippur to Talk Like a Pirate Day.
Only partially joking. Cannabis has contributed in an extremely positive way to my life. And it’s real, which is more than I believe about the gods people worship. Puff and then to the left.
Some branches of the various Orthodox Catholic Churches that I know of sometimes use the term “High Holy Days” to differentiate from the various “feast days” we observed. But some of us on the Russian Orthodox side tend to be a bit Petrine in our doctrine and a fair amount of the Jewish traditions, in a sense, are followed. It is fading somewhat as even the Original Ritualists have advanced slightly (call it roughly the yeat 1550 ) but it still crops up now and then.
