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→The Term ''Easter''
Some Orthodox Christians discourage the use of the word ''Easter'', believing that the term has roots in [[paganism|pagan]] rites of the spring equinox and overtones of fertility. Most English speakers are unaware of the etymological origins of ''Easter'', however, and use it without any sense of pagan connotations, and so ''Easter'' is also used by many Orthodox English speakers.
The origin of the term ''Easter'' comes from the Germanic name for the month in which the Christian feast usually fell, and so, just as the American civic holiday of the Fourth of July has nothing to do with Julius Caesar for whom July was named, neither does Easter have anything to do with the pagan goddess Eostre, the namesake of the month in which Pascha fell. This potential difficulty only exists for speakers of Germanic languages, however. Most languages in the world use a cognate form of the Greek term ''Pascha'' and so are ignorant free of any pagan connotations for the name of the feast.
According to [[Bede]], writing in ''De Tempore Rationum'' ("On the Reckoning of Time"), Ch. xv, "The English months," the word is derived from Eostre, a festival. Bede connects it with an Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring, to whom the month answering to our April, and called ''Eostur-monath'', was dedicated. The connection is often assumed, without quoting Bede himself, who says,
