Mass readings for the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord:
Malachi 3.1-4 Psalm 24.7-10 Hebrews 2.10-11,13b-18 Luke 2.22-40
This is my first Candlemas celebrated in this parish as the Sunday liturgy; it’s quite nice to highlight this event of Jesus’ presentation in the temple to the many who can’t make it out to the celebration when it falls on a weeknight. How Jesus being brought to the temple became associated with candles is one of those long histories that liturgy scholars love, but for popular consumption, for a homily on a Saturday night or Sunday morning, really needs to be abridged.
I think we can all comprehend the symbolism of the candles, lit and carried, blessed and made ready for use in our homes and in our church – these represent to us and, we hope to others, the light of Christ we take into the world.
But as a light, it is at this point a small one. This is forty days since Christmas, and there is an ancient Christian tradition that marks this as the end of the Christmas season, and not Epiphany. So, if anyone still has their Christmas tree up, here is your defense: you’re very traditional! But it is time to take it down.
Forty days… think of a child at forty days: how small and vulnerable, how careful we must be with that little life. As you carry one of the lit candles around the church, I hope it had the effect of making you conscious of the easiness of snuffing it out. To do this liturgy properly, we should really start outside in the cold; but as we’re only just reintroducing this to parish life, I thought it ambitious enough to do the procession inside. But think about us all standing out there, with the wind maybe whipping up, the pavement icy, and we just have these little plastic wind-guards and our bodies to protect the flame we’ve been given.
With some humour the ushers have seen altar servers lighting processional candles before masses, unintentionally blowing them out before they can be lowered into their protective globes; at the services of baptism, it is a bit of a running gag that the first big job a godparent has is to light the child’s baptismal candle from the big Paschal candle and to successfully bring it lit to the newly baptized. Every once in a while, the new godfather or godmother doesn’t make it! And I kid them about it, and then remind them that their job should only get more challenging than that, not easier.
When we can do this at night, the light in the darkness, even the collective light of a congregation’s individual candles, can’t light up this space in anyway close to the degree the Sun does when it comes in through the stained-glass windows. Hopefully that humbles us a bit in terms of just how brilliant we may think we are.
We have something that needs to be protected, even as it needs to be shared, something that we guard, but not so closely that others cannot see.
These are important lessons to take from this: the light we possess is small, but it is given to us not merely for safekeeping; it is a light to lighten our way in a world that is often quite dark, but it’s also a signal to those who dwell in complete darkness that they can have this light too. As Jesus says later in the gospel, this light you’ve been given isn’t to be taken into your home and then hid under a bushel basket, but it is to be put in the candlestand where it will give light to the whole household. And think of how Jesus speaks of his bringing fire into this world, a great “refining” flame, that he said, he wished was already kindled – was he referring then to the flames of Pentecost, the inflaming of the Church as a beacon of hope to a world in darkness, to give warmth to the individuals who follow Jesus, to the community that gathers in his name?
There is a very great possibility that in the coming year we’re going to be called upon to offer something more than candles and their modest light. The affordability crisis has slightly abated yet is still with us, and I’m sure we’re all aware of other matters that could make the economic situation worse. We will need to pull together as a faith community and provide an example to the wider civil community of what can be accomplished through an ethic of mutual care, what can be done when we bring our little lights together so as to diminish fear, and bring the comfort that comes of keeping company together, especially in the dark and the cold.
Our stewardship group is busy. I’m sure many understand the word “stewardship” as a synonym for “fundraising.” I’m glad to say that is not the sensibility of those doing this good work. Rather, they know that the real treasure among is the fire we carry within us, that fed by the breath of God’s Holy Spirit, can grow and spread, among us first, and then to many more. So, all of us are to be ready to bring that our little flames out to be seen, in whatever way we can, to not hold back from what God is inviting us into.
The letter to the Hebrews, the excerpt of it proclaimed today, it reminds us that Jesus did come to help Angels, but rather the descendants of Abraham; and that’s why Christ became one of us, became “like his brothers and sisters in every respect…” is how we heard that described. We in turn, being Christ’s brothers and sisters are to reciprocate and strive to become like him, and so also to help the children of Abraham today. We are the body of the Christ in the world, and we continue our Lord’s self-offering, his sacrifice in love, his suffering in compassion for the world, and so rescue souls that otherwise will despair and be destroyed.
This is to say, whatever sacrifice that is asked of us is not for upkeep of this building for its own sake, but rather to make this a place of encounter with those angels, and the saints, and most importantly, with God.
Simeon warned Joseph and Mary, that as wonderful as their child was, how he was the salvation of the world, he would be opposed. And I’m sure we will be opposed, but from where that opposition will come, I can’t be sure. It could come from among us, it could come from within, it could come from our fears of what it might cost us – and so, we hide the light we’ve received, and then then wind up smothering it. For as Simeon prophesied Christ will be the cause of the rising of many who respond to him, but also the falling of others, that his presence unmasks those who only pretend to a virtuous life, but cannot bring themselves to suffer for others, to sacrifice for God, and so, accomplish his will on Earth.
It was a fearsome thing for Mary and Joseph; for when they said ‘yes’ to God, the project of the incarnation was still an abstraction – now, standing in the Temple, it is very real to them. And the euphoria of the birth, the wonder of the nativity night has long past, and now is the beginning of what the tradition calls the long silent years in Nazareth. Yet we know these, for all their “silence” were nonetheless busy for the Holy Family; as they cared for the Christ child, and nurtured the young Jesus, fulfilling the will of God that this should be done.
Remember what we pray for every time we say the ‘Our Father’—that his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And his will is directed toward the saving of souls, and not just the rescue of the lost, but the sanctification of all who are found in Christ, all who come to see in our Lord salvation, and manifest his love in the presence of others, bring the light of his revelation to them, for the glory of his name.
Amen.