Dear Wreath Wranglers:

So many of our Christmas traditions have two things in common: 1) They’re not as ancient as we think; and 2) They find their roots in Germany. Consider, by example, the humble Advent wreath. Johann Hinrich Wichern was one of eight children born to a poor family in Hamburg, Germany. Involved in the local church, he became a Protestant Sunday School teacher, holding classes that were extremely popular for their use of inventive symbols to convey the Gospel. At the age of 25, Wichern, concerned with the welfare of orphans and ex-convicts, founded a youth hostel in Horn, now a suburb of Hamburg, which he named Rauhes Haus (trans. Rough House). The facility, still in operation to this day, provided shelter, Christian education and vocational training to over 100 residents.

In 1839, Wichern was providing instruction for the Advent season. Taking a discarded wagon wheel, he turned it on its side and placed 20 small red candles and four larger white candles in succession around the wheel. Each weekday evening before scripture lessons, he would light one of the red candles, leaving the larger white candles for Sundays. This first Advent wreath marked the days from the first of December through Christmas Eve. It was an Advent calendar in light.

When the symbolic wreath was moved into churches, the daily candles were dropped, and the four Sundays prior to Christmas were ignited as part of the Advent liturgy. By the end of the century, Roman Catholic congregations also adopted the wreath, which became popular in the United States in the 1920s and '30s—another German import, like the Christmas tree, impacting American celebration of Christmastide. More recently, some Eastern Orthodox churches have adopted the wreath; theirs have six candles, however, because Advent in the Eastern Rite is forty days rather than four weeks.

Which brings me to my current musing—trying to figure out what each candle means. Traditionally, each candle symbolizes one of the four reactions to Christ’s birth—Hope, Peace, Joy and Love, but not necessarily in that order. If you find yourself celebrating in an Anglican church, then the candles represent Hope, the Hebrew Prophets, John the Baptist and the Virgin Mary. Another interpretation suggests the candles represent Prophecy, Mary and Joseph, the Shepherds and the Angels. Still others commend the order Hope, Love, Joy and Peace, placing the emphasis on the coming Prince of Peace. Some traditions light the pink (rose)-colored candle as the fourth candle as we move from penitent purple to wondrous white. Others light the pink (rose) candle on whatever Sunday Mary’s Magnificat is read from the lectionary, owing to the rose being one of many symbols referring to the Virgin Mary. Roman Catholics, Lutherans and Anglicans light the pink (rose, I know it’s called rose, but it still looks pink to me) on the Third Sunday, known as Gaudete Sunday, from the Latin word for Joy. To be fair, the tradition has only been around for 190 years, so as Christian symbols go, we’re still refining what it means to do it right. Or, to put it another way, no matter how you do it, someone will point out you’re getting it wrong.

And that’s my Musing for the first Monday of Advent. Figuring out how to do a “traditional” Christmas is a murky business. No matter what you choose to do in preparation for the celebration of Christ’s birth, even the most calcified traditions began as someone’s improvised guess. Perhaps the most important value to learn from Johann Wichern’s first Advent wreath is coming up with ways to keep the kids from roughhousing in the days before Christmas.

Completely confused as to why some churches have shifted to Advent blue, I remain,

With Love,
Jonathan Krogh
Your Pastor