04 April 2021

Talks on the Sacramentals, by Msgr Arthur Tonne - Vigil Lights

"Watch, then, praying at all times, that you may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that are to be, and to stand before the son of Man." St. Luke, 21:36.

At the end of this Mass you will notice the server come from the sacristy and put out the candles on the altar. Puff, and out goes the light. But do you know that the light of a candle never goes out? What do I mean? I mean that when you snuff out a candle the flame disappears, you cannot see it anymore.

But the light of that flame is not out. The light of that candle is still going on and on and on into space. That is hard to believe, isn't it? Nevertheless, that is what science tells us.

Let me quote to you the words of an eminent American scientist, one of the very best in his field, Professor Arthur Compton. He uses some pretty big words, but we can get the general idea:

"Puff, and the flame is out! Is this the end? What is happening to the light? The flame was material, made up of atoms and molecules; but the light is a different kind of thing-- electromagnetic radiation, flying away at tremendous speed. We know that if the candle was out under the open sky, its light was streaming into interstellar space, where it will keep going forever."

Mark those words of this man of science--the light of that candle will keep going forever. It goes up to join the stars in space. It never dies.

All the more, if the light of that candle and of every candle will never die, so the love that lit that candle will never die. There is one reason for the Catholic practice of using Vigil Lights. You will notice some of them before the altar of our Blessed Mother, and a few before the statue of St. Anthony. So often we are asked:

"What are those little red lights burning for?"

Vigil means watch or watching or guarding. A Vigil Light is a watching light, a light that keeps watching for us while we are away. A Vigil Light symbolizes the continuance of the prayers made before the Blessed Sacrament, or before the statue or shrine of some saint, after the worshipper has been called away by the demands of daily life.

For example, suppose your mother is sick. Before school or work in the morning you come here to church to pray for her. You stay for some time begging our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament to make your mother well. Then you must hurry off to your books or to your office. Before leaving you light one of those little Vigil Lights, after paying for it, of course. Your nickel or dime helps us keep a supply of these candles. Some burn for 12 or 14 hours. Those large ones before the altar of Mary will burn for 7 or 8 days. That burning light, that watching light expresses the idea that you would like to stay and keep on praying God to help your mother. You can't stay. The Vigil Light stays in your place. It represents you and your petition. It keeps jumping up and down and stretching toward God, just as your heart did while making your prayer.

1. Most of those Vigil Lights are red--red like the warm blood that is coursing through your veins and heart, red like roses that you have presented and left with a friend, red like the praying lips of an innocent child. That light is red like your heart, for it represents your heart, your heart that throbs with love for Christ in the Eucharist your heart this is wrung with sorrow or aching with anxiety or sick with sin.

2. Those Vigil Lights burn continuously. They keep on burning just as the desire and prayer of our hearts keep on burning. They burn when the church is crowded with people and they burn when there is no one present to love our Lord on the Altar. They burn during the day as the sun streams in through the windows, and they burn when the lights of the city have been almost entirely extinguished. Through the long hours of the night they keep our Lord company. They are a partial fulfillment of our Lord's command:

"Watch, then, praying at all times." St. Luke, 21:36.

3. Those lights are eloquent. They tell our Lord that the one who lit them really loves Him. They tell our Blessed Mother that you want her to watch over you and over your loved ones as constantly and as lovingly as your little light burns before her. They tell the saints that we are thinking of them hour after hour.

Those flickering flames are the voices and the lips of the adoring, the thanking, the begging and the sinful.

4. Vigil Lights are symbols of faith, the faith which tells us that Christ lives here, the faith which assures us that His Mother and His saints will intercede for us.

5. Were Vigil Lights able to talk to us they would tell us tales like these: A sorrowing widow placed me here, when she hurried off to work in a restaurant to support herself and children. An anxious mother placed me here to plead God to protect her teen- age daughter. A sinner put me here to beg God's grace and strength for a comeback. An expectant mother set me here to ask God's blessing on herself and her child.

You will find every need of body and soul, every worthwhile desire of the human heart represented here. Those Vigil Lights grouped near the sanctuary of Christ remind me powerfully of the varied crowds that elbowed their way close to Christ when He walked this earth, each with some request, each with some need, each with some prayer.

Yes, their light never goes out. Even though the little flame will die down and disappear, it goes on. Every light in the Catholic Church is a symbol of Christ, the Light of the World. When He died on the cross His light did not disappear. It kept going. Father Faber has put some of these thoughts into poetry:

"O happy lights! O happy lights! Watching my Jesus livelong nights; How close you cluster round His throne, Dying so meekly one by one, As each its faithful watch has done. Could I with you but take my turn, And burn with love of Him and burn Till love had wasted me like you, Sweet lights! What better could I do?" Amen.

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