Peace Candle
NEW GUILD MINISTRY
It is with great happiness we announce that the guild of St. Oswald’s has begun a new ministry that of giving a Candle Of Peace to anyone visiting St. Oswald’s from another parish. Our priest Gordon and his wife Val received a Candle Of Peace while at St. George’s Anglican Church in Maple Ridge. The idea is that the candle given will be taken back to the visitor’s parish, so that the candle can be lit each week and remind us to be ever faithful to include prayers for peace. Along with the candle, the visitor is given a card which explains how this all began.
Lighting A Candle For Peace
In 1985, The Rev. Blair R. Monte, an American Presbyterian Minister visited the Soviet Union. In the small Voronezh, he was approached by an elderly woman who pressed a small sum of money into his hand and requested that he do something for world peace. He recognized a deep desire and strong devotion in her eyes and voice and he determined he would do something special when he returned home.
What could he do with three rubles? After much thought, he purchased a small votive candle, placed it on the Communion table and lit it. His congregation agreed to make it a permanent accessory in their sanctuary and purchased a supply of candles to make the peace candle available to visitors wishing to take it back to their own church. And so it began a tradition of burning a peace candle during each service. When we see the glow of our peace candle burning, we are reminded to offer our prayers for peace. Today candles burn in England, Australia, Ireland, Kuwait, South Africa, Denmark and Canada.
A peace candle was brought to St. Oswald's Anglican Church in 2017. Visitors to St. Oswald's are now invited to take a candle back to their congregation in an effort to spread the tradition and the prayer for peace.
As a recipient of the peace candle we encourage you to burn a peace candle on your Altar and pray for peace weekly. We also encourage you, as a way to continue this prayer throughout the world to offer peace candles to visitors to your own church.
Prayer of St. Francis
Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love; Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light; Where there is sadness, joy;
O, Divine Master, grant that I may not
so much seek to be consoled as to console.
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
It is in dying that we are born again to eternal life.
Since June of 2017, St. Oswald’s Anglican Church has given away 11 Candles For Peace, two to England, one each to Ireland and Wales and the others to different parts of Canada.