1 February 2024
It has been a busy week preparing for Candlemas, and all is mostly ready. For some background on this feast, here is an excerpt from the sermon:
“Historically the Presentation of our Lord Jesus in the Temple has been important for Christians. It is a major feast, and in our Prayer Book, it is one of a few days, that if it falls on a Sunday, it does not get transferred to the next day. That is how important this day is.
“Today’s story, similar to the Christmas story about the shepherds and the angels, is only found in the Gospel of Saint Luke. We are told that Mary and Joseph, according to the Mosaic Law, bring the infant Jesus to the Temple in Jerusalem on the fortieth day after his birth. Having been named and circumcised on the eighth day, now on the fortieth day the time has come to bring their first-born son to the Temple with the prescribed offerings. It is there that Simeon and Anna greet the Messiah with joy. They have been keeping vigil faithfully in the Temple for years, and now the moment they have been waiting for has arrived. The Lord has entered his Temple - the King has come in glory.”
The reality is that most people have not experienced the beautiful feast of Candlemas. In fact, even most Christians are in the dark about this feast, thinking February 2 is solely about a groundhog. Whereas Christmas has been co-opted by secular culture, and whereas Easter has been massaged into a celebration of spring, the Presentation has simply been ignored in modern times. You will be hard pressed to find Candlemas greeting cards in the stores.
Historically this has not been the case, as throughout the centuries February 2 has been a popular Christian festival. Sometimes called Little Christmas, February 2 was, and continues to be, the day when churches bless candles, and this is because of the song that Simeon proclaims in the Gospel of the day. Jesus has been presented in the Temple, the true Lamb of sacrifice has been brought, and because of this true and sufficient sacrifice, Jesus is the light to enlighten the nations.
Sadly, much of modern Christianity has little interest in feast days and seasons, with most worship only occurring on Sundays. Catholic Christians observe fewer weekday feasts as time passes by, and Protestants have never had such celebrations in their DNA. Feasts such as Candlemas are typically left un-celebrated by the Church, and our expression of the faith suffers as a result. Adding to this malnourishment is the reality that many Christians are poorly educated in the Scriptures, and a good deal of Christianity has morphed into new age spirituality, or moral therapeutic deism, with a gloss of Jesus when convenient. (I had a surreal encounter recently where a leader of the Episcopal Church gave thanks that Sunday worship was no longer necessary, after which said person invited the group to make cleansing breaths together.)
I hope you can join us for Candlemas. We will not ask you to make cleansing breaths, but we will light candles in honor of Jesus, the Light coming into our world. Our keeping of these feast days celebrates biblical faith, as well as catholic orthodoxy. There is so much more to the faith than our modern, generic, idealization of love and wellness. Come and discover how Jesus is the Light saving the world, and how this very Light presented in the Temple, shall become the sacrifice of the cross that purifies our hearts and saves everything this Easter.
Father Paul Lillie +
