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Why isn’t Ascension Day a public holiday in Spain?

Spain is still a rather religious country, so why isn't Ascension Day a public holiday here?

Published: 17 May 2023 17:27 CEST
Updated: 9 May 2024 09:35 CEST

Why isn't Ascension Day a public holiday in Spain?

A Spanish priest celebrates mass at the Colegiata de Santa Maria la Mayor in Ronda. Photo: JORGE GUERRERO/AFP.

Thursday 9th May 2024 is Ascension Day, the day many Christians believe commemorates the ascension of Christ to heaven, following 40 days of preaching after his resurrection on Easter Sunday.

This means that it doesn’t always fall on May 9th, rather it changes each year depending on when Easter is.

According to Christian tradition, Ascension Day celebrates the day Jesus ascended into heaven at Bethany or the Mount of Olives, near Jerusalem. It is celebrated across all branches of Christianity on the sixth Thursday after Easter. That doesn’t mean it is a public holiday everywhere, however.

In many parts of Europe, it is a public holiday, including the Benelux countries of Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg, as well as France, Germany, Austria, Liechtenstein, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Iceland. Certain parts of Switzerland also have a day off.

READ ALSO: Calendar: When are Spain’s public holidays in 2023?

But in Spain, a country known for its religious festivities, it is not a public holiday and not really celebrated outside Mass.

Why is this?

Generally speaking, traditionally Catholic countries such as Spain don’t place such an emphasis on Ascension Day. Rather, many Roman Catholic countries, such as Poland, Italy, and Hungary, as well as Spain, tend to celebrate the ascension on the Sunday before Pentecost and view the Assumption of Mary (Asunción de la Virgen in Spanish) on August 15th as the more important celebration.

Asunción de la Virgen is a very Spanish Catholic tradition, when Roman Catholics commemorate the body and soul of the Virgin Mary, rather than her son Jesus, ascending to heaven.

READ ALSO: Why you should visit Barcelona’s quirky egg dancing festival

Asunción de la Virgen is a national holiday in Spain, and some parts of Spain also celebrate The Feast of Corpus Christi on June 11th with ornate carpets made of flowers or even dancing eggs, like in Barcelona.

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EXPLAINED: How Spain's new Social Security app works

Spain’s Social Security Ministry has launched a new free mobile app aimed at simplifying and synchronising tax, pension and working life procedures, allowing you to better access records and update information.

The app is specifically aimed at easing the bureaucratic burden on the self-employed, domestic workers, artists and young people studying or doing work experience.

Spain’s Minister for Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, Elma Saiz, presented the app this week, stating that it represents “a great step forward for citizens to have a closer and more fluid relationship with Social Security.

Through this application, personal data can be updated and verified; detailed information on contribution bases can be accessed and your Work Life report can be easily downloaded, among many other services.”

In Spain, your ‘Working Life report’ is known as el informe de vida laboral. According to the Social Security website, it is “a document that contains information on all the periods contributed by the worker to the Spanish Social Security system.” In other words, all the information on your entire employment history in Spain.

READ ALSO: How to check how long you have left to get a pension in Spain

The app essentially moves over the various processes usually done on the Social Security portal or in Spain’s social security offices so users can receive a more personalised service including tailored alerts and the ability to download documents to their mobile phones in offline mode.

It also allows users to easily check the details of their working life including for who and for how long they’ve worked somewhere, the type of contract they have, the working day or the relevant collective bargaining agreement, as well as information on contribution bases and how much they are owed in the event of sick leave and for calculating your pension.

How do I access and use the app?

First you’ll need to download the app from the Google Play or Apple App store. Once you’ve downloaded it to your phone, there are three ways to log-in in and register:

Permanent Cl@ve
Digital certificate (Android only)
SMS

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Once registered and logged in, push notifications can be turned on as well as a biometric access — either fingerprint or facial recognition.

Once this has been done, you can access your personal information, whether it be working or pension matters, and all the normal procedures you’d previously do via the portal can be carried out and all this information can be downloaded in files.

What can you do with the app?

As mentioned earlier, the new app basically aims to streamline the processes you’d normally do via the Social Security Ministry portal or in person.

This includes checking your social security number or requesting one, consulting your tax contribution bases and employment history, updating your personal details, or managing tasks for the self-employed, domestic workers artists or young people doing work experience, such as registering or deregistering as economically active and downloading supporting documents.

READ ALSO: How to de-register as self-employed in Spain

Focus on young people, freelancers, artists and domestic employment

The application offers four different profiles to use the app: self-employed, domestic employment (for both employees and employers), artists and trainees.

The autónomo profile allows you to access all the information and procedures available if you are registered or are about to start self-employment, including registration and de-registration, modifying your contribution base, consulting tax receipts, and estimating your contributions according to your income, among other things.

In the domestic employment section, whether you yourself work domestically or are going to hire someone to work at home, you can consult all the necessary information such as calculating the contributions to be paid, registering and de-registering, updating the salary information and the working hours of the employee, or consulting payslips issued.

READ ALSO: The rules for hiring a domestic worker in Spain

For artists, you can manage your inactivity, request a refund of income from contribution bases or deregister from the working artists’ register.

For students doing internships or work experience (alumnos en prácticas in Spanish) the app is useful for both those about to start their internships and for those who’ve already started them, with access to their personal profile, a guide to resolve doubts, information to find out about the benefits of pensions contributions and they can carry out procedures such as requesting the social security number, downloading the Work Life Report and consulting contribution bases.

READ ALSO: How self-employed workers in Spain can get a better pension

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