The designers of the post-Vatican II lectionary system came up with 34 weeks of “Tempus per annum” (badly translated into English as “Ordinary Time”). We would read scripture texts systematically (semi-continuously) from the Baptism of Christ (the Sunday between 7 and 13 January) until Ash Wednesday. And then, cleverly, we would essentially pick up that reading discipline again after the Day of Pentecost. I say “essentially” because sometimes a week would need to be skipped. The decision was made that this “skipping” would happen not at the end of the Church Year but in the middle of “behind/under/hidden by” the large seasonal block of Lent and Easter (96 days: 46 days of Lent plus 50 days of Easter).
Visualise (say on the disc in the image above) the Lent-Easter wedge being able to rotate back and forward somewhat increasing Ordinary Time before that wedge while decreasing it after; or vice versa: decreasing before; increasing after. You can visualise the number 8 before the wedge (skipping 9 under the wedge) and 10 appearing after it for this year, a year that only needs 33 Ordinary Weeks. The next few years, similarly, only need 33 Ordinary weeks. 2026 – as another example – has 6 Ordinary Weeks before Lent, skips Week 7 under the Lent-Easter wedge giving the 8th Week starting at the Day of Pentecost. 2029, however, needs all 34 Ordinary Weeks: 6 before Lent, picking up with Week 7 after the Easter Season.
Some people, looking only at Sundays, will wonder why far more “Ordinary Sundays” appear to be skipped year by year. But remember Ordinary Time is about weeks (yes, there are weekday readings for every day of the week!). Some Sundays in Ordinary Time are displaced by other celebrations. The Sunday, this year for example, at the start of the 10th Ordinary Week is the Day of Pentecost. The start of the 11th Ordinary Week is Trinity Sunday. And many people will begin the 12th Ordinary Week by celebrating Corpus Christi (or in New Zealand Anglicanism, Te Pouhere Sunday).
So you can clearly see how all 34 Ordinary Weeks are needed, here is my chart for the next quarter century:
| Ordinary Time Before Lent | Ordinary Time After Easter Season | |
| 2025 | 8 | 10 |
| 2026 | 6 | 8 |
| 2027 | 5 | 7 |
| 2028 | 7 | 9 |
| 2029 | 6 | 7 |
| 2030 | 9 | 10 |
| 2031 | 7 | 9 |
| 2032 | 5 | 7 |
| 2033 | 8 | 10 |
| 2034 | 7 | 8 |
| 2035 | 5 | 6 |
| 2036 | 8 | 9 |
| 2037 | 6 | 8 |
| 2038 | 9 | 11 |
| 2039 | 7 | 9 |
| 2040 | 6 | 7 |
| 2041 | 8 | 10 |
| 2042 | 6 | 8 |
| 2043 | 5 | 7 |
| 2044 | 8 | 10 |
| 2045 | 7 | 8 |
| 2046 | 5 | 6 |
| 2047 | 7 | 9 |
| 2048 | 6 | 8 |
| 2049 | 8 | 10 |
| 2050 | 7 | 9 |
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