by Kimberlee Conway Ireton

It’s dinner time. The table is set: plates, forks, knives, glasses. In the center of the table is a taper candle in a glass candlestick, a gift from my parents over a decade ago. Right now, because it’s Ordinary Time, the candle is green. We come to the table, my husband, our children, and I. Doug lights a match and touches it to the candle’s wick. “Bless the Lord,” I say. “The Lord’s name be praised,” Doug and Jack chorus, and even Jane joins in with a lisping version of those words.

This is our nightly ritual: the lighting of the candle, whose color changes with the liturgical seasons, and the short call-and-response litany, whose words also change with the seasons. It’s become so second nature that my son asked the other day, “When will we get to say, ‘Christ is risen’ again?” (“Next spring,” I said, “when it’s Easter again.”)

“Bringing the Church Year Home” doesn’t have to look or even feel grand. It’s simpler than that, as my little candle lighting story demonstrates, but in spite of its simplicity, celebrating the liturgical seasons at home can help us introduce our kids to the richness of faith in Christ, tie our lives at home to what happens on Sunday at church, and live together the texture of time as the church experiences it.

I will be speaking about the church year and ways to bring its seasonal rhythms into our daily lives on Thursday evening, November 13, at 7:00 in the Parlor. Childcare will be provided.

Editor’s Note: Kimberlee’s book, The Circle of Seasons: Meeting God in the Church Year, was published in October by InterVarsity Press.