Church Candles - A guide for churchwardens (and others)

Having recently found myself in conversation with a churchwarden over the issue of communion wine and wafers the conversation turned to the ever present issue of church candles. Oil-filled or made of wax? And if you go for wax do you want 'natural' or should you pay the extra for white?

Having decided on the material the candles are made from you are then faced with further choices:

What diameter candles would you like? 
For they come in a variety of diameters (imperial or metric) ranging from 1/2" through to 4" in old money (13 - 100mm in new) .

How long would you like it?
No, I don't mean the burning time (but this is a consideration) but the length of the blessed thing!
They come in a variety of lengths ranging from 6" through to 42" (150 - 1060mm).

Burning time
Just when you thought you had it all squared away some clever soul will ask you, 'How long would you like them to burn?" The answer is simple in that I don't want to be changing them during the service!

But this is a good question because some candles burn slower than others and so last longer and present a bit of economic consideration because if the cost a little more and last a lot longer then the burn per hour per pence factor comes into play (Yes, I was bitten by a real candle anorak).

If your candle is 1 1/2" (30mm) x 12" (300mm) and it burns for 21 hours at £1.98 and another burns for 13hrs @ £1.79 then you're paying 9.42 pence per hour for the more expensive candle versus 13.77 for what appeared at first glance to be the cheaper second option.

Now although this really is anorak world stuff there are some serious issues her in that a church with three services on a Sunday may well clock up 240 minutes of use on a Sunday which means you're getting through a pair of candles (assuming you're not in Pugin of course) every five weeks on the 'expensive' candles and every three weeks with the cheaper! So putting cost aside where are you  going to store all the candles you'll need (24 expensive would last a year of 'normal Sundays whilst you're going to need 36 of the cheaper) and they all take up space!

And then one of the smart people in the DCC/PCC pipes up with, 'I went to a church last weekend and they had really nice plastic candles what worked off of oil and . . . '

But that's for another day.

St George's, Whittington all ready to celebrate St Thomas
(12 candles in all - 3 different sizes!)

As a postscript:
The same applies to tealights but without the diameter issue (but would you like them in foil, red or blue plastic, clear casing or . . . . )
TOP TIP
Wilkinsons do 100 for £2 with a rated burn time of 3.5 hours which is great value as the last lot I purchased from a 'proper church suppliers)  around £9.50 (with delivery) for the same number of them in the box and I bought them in bulk (five boxes - what a mug I was then) :-)

Paying the Share (1): À la carte church

Thinking of ways in which churches might raise money yielded some interesting ways forward. Here's the first in a series of (at least one):

The 'a la carte' church

(Click on the image for full-size version)

I think this might be one of the most innovative ways of raising your Parish Share - look at the benefits:

No more tedious and trying sermons on tithing or being a cheerful giver!

Meets the Consumer Churchgoers where they feel most comfortable!

No more complaints about Church after the Service - You Want it? You Got it!

(If this doesn't get me a pointy hat I don't know what will*)

Pax

* showed it to the wife and she thinks it'll get me a straight-jacket and soft walled room!!!

What colour are yours? Liturgical lessons 1

Hello people.

Are you sitting comfortably?

Long, long ago, when I was only just learning about colours and seasons in the church (having come from a cords, brown shoes, check shirt and horn-rimmed glasses church background) I went away on a weekend course teaching us about liturgy.

Friday came and went and every step was a new piece of information about the seasons, morning prayer, evening prayer and, can you believe it, night prayer too! We were invited to join one of the many groups doing prayer at the end of the first day. This was wall-to-wall revelation time for me and it was here that I learned that complign was actually complin (even though it is spelled 'compline' of course) and how it spoke of 'completeness' and the the of the day.

Saturday came and after morning prayer (the night has passed and the day lies open before us . .) we were treated definitions, descriptions and means of handling Psalms and greater and lesser endings, collects and BCP vs modern variants of them. The Gloria was explained (along with why some looked at their shoes during the first bit of it) and the means by which multiple Psalms could be said without returning to it each and every time. We discussed antiphonal readings (which being paid to sing Gregorian stuff was something, probably the only thing in fact, I actually knew about!) and the purpose of the Psalm in worship (NO, it cannot be used to replace one of the other set readings).

Lunch came and a few of us decided, having seen the scoff, to absent ourselves and visit the local hostelry for pie and a pint. Returning just a tad late there were three of us who, having signed up for the same 'break out' session, crept stealthily into the back of the lecture theatre.

The woman lecturing having finished her introduction then moved on to the session proper and it went a little like this:

"one of the tings that I really like to do is to have my clothes match the colours of the liturgical season we are in. For instance I have discovered that H&M do a really nice range of suspender belts, bras and knickers in gold for Christmas and Easter Sunday . . . ."

The three of us looked at each other and wondered what on earth was going on. I wondered whether our absence had been noted and what we were experiencing was a set-up, but 'No', she continued to explain how certain clothing outlets sold purple items of 'intimate apparel' (what she described beautifully) for Lent and Advent,

Green, for ordinary time was limited to but a few shops whilst most outlets stocked red (for Pentecost and certain saint's days).

White was easy to find anywhere and so was merely passed by with a cursory note about easter, Christmas and others festivals when you didn't want to wear your gold stuff!

I was surprised to hear that whilst many shops stocked black, this was only worn by her on All Saints and Good Friday!

Seems that the biggest problem was getting good coloured tights that were sheer for if one was not careful you'd end up with Norah Batty tights (which of course would never do)!

The lecturer went on to explain that she didn't usually disclose the underwear thing but as this was a ladies only group she felt that it was safe to do so. She then proceeded to tell the group how we were going to do an exercise with the church's calendar and what colours we thought (or perhaps knew) would be right for them and as they started to pass the papers back, the three of us crept out before we were rumbled.

A little later, during afternoon tea, we found a couple of other people who had also been signed up for our break out group and discovered that due to numbers we had been moved into the, much smaller, chapel.

Which is where we went for the remainder of the session.

Mind you, I've never forgotten the colours of the liturgical calendar.

And the women lecturer?

Her identity is safe lest her face matches her intimate apparel come Pentecost :-)

Beggars the question though   .. . . . . . "What colour are yours?

:-)

Happy Friday