May we light candles tonight
“Iwill light Candles this Christmas,” wrote theologian Howard Thurman in a poem published after his death in 1981. “Candles of joy despite all sadness, candles of hope where despair keeps watch, candles of courage for fears ever present.”
The Rev. Thurman knew only too well the shadows of sadness, despair and fear. As an African American boy growing up in Florida, he’d experienced firsthand the long night of segregation and the ever-present fear of racial violence. As an adult, he learned racism and hatred weren’t confined to one state or region. Thurman came of age during World War I when African Americans fought and died for their country but then came home to a nation that still denied their full humanity. He was 19 when the 1921 flu pandemic broke out, exposing the country’s chasms between class and race.
Yet Thurman also knew the power of light to dispel those shadows. Connecting prayer and faith with resistance and social justice, he called Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, John Lewis and others in the Civil Rights Movement to light their candles of courage and hope. Once lit, their candles helped change this nation and the world.
Santa Feans know about lighting candles at Christmas. Sunday night, all around the city, thousands of small votive candles inside brown paper bags will illuminate walkways, driveways and roofs. In the Hispanic Catholic tradition, farolitos (“little lights”) helped guide Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem’s stable. In my own life, when I returned to the Southwest after a 10-year sojourn away for seminary and work, Santa Fe’s farolitos reminded me I was finally home.
Those little farolito candles can also teach us what’s possible when we share the light. No one votive candle provides much illumination, but together all those farolito candles create a blessing of peace and beauty throughout our community.
People in many traditions also know the power of candlelight, especially when it’s shared and especially in the darkest time of the year. Every December, Jews light eight candles on the menorah, Christians the five candles of the Advent wreath, and African Americans the seven candles of Kwanzaa.
Coming together with candlelight can remind us of Thurman’s promise of “joy despite all sadness, hope where despair keeps watch, [and] courage for fears ever present.” At the end of Christmas Eve services in many churches (including the one I serve), the congregation will pass the light from the Christmas candle to one another, old and young alike, with small individual candles. Like the farolito votives, no one candle can dispel all the shadows of sadness or fear, but together those little Christmas candles can bathe an entire sanctuary in light. Together that candlelight can help us trust again the possibility of joy, hope and courage — if only for this night.
“I will light candles this Christmas,” Thurman’s poem continued, “Candles of peace for tempest-tossed days, candles of grace to ease heavy burdens, candles of love to inspire all my living.”
Peace and grace, love and joy, courage and hope. May we light such candles this Christmas, and may they be, in Thurman’s final words, “candles that burn all the year long.”
Blessings for this season of light.
Those little farolito candles can also teach us what’s possible when we share the light.
The Rev. Talitha Arnold is the senior minister, United Church of Santa Fe.