{"id":114,"date":"2013-05-23T15:18:46","date_gmt":"2013-05-23T15:18:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/user44356.vs.easily.co.uk\/?page_id=114"},"modified":"2020-12-07T15:53:25","modified_gmt":"2020-12-07T15:53:25","slug":"christingle","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.fulneck.org.uk\/?page_id=114","title":{"rendered":"Christingle"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nPhoto by Claire Newman<\/em><\/p>\n

Many people have heard of Christingles and Christingle Services have\u00a0become very popular in Churches at Christmas time, but few people realise that\u00a0it originates in the Moravian Church.<\/p>\n

The origins of the Christingle can be traced back to Marienborn Moravian Church in Germany on 20th December 1747.\u00a0At a\u00a0children\u2019s service hymns were sung and the minister, John de Watteville, read\u00a0 verses which the children had written to celebrate the birth of Jesus.\u00a0He then explained to the children the\u00a0happiness which had come to people through Jesus, \u201cwho has kindled in each little heart a flame which keeps burning to their joy and our happiness\u201d.<\/p>\n

To make the point even clearer, each child then received a little\u00a0lighted wax candle, tied round with a red ribbon. The minister ended the service with this prayer, \u201cLord Jesus, kindle a flame in these children\u2019s hearts, that theirs\u00a0like Thine become\u201d.\u00a0The Marienborn Church\u00a0Diary concludes, \u201chereupon the children went full of joy with their lighted\u00a0candles to their rooms and so went glad and happy to bed\u201d.<\/p>\n

The Moravian Church took the custom of this Candle Service to\u00a0Labrador and Pennsylvania, to Tibet and Suriname,\u00a0to the Caribbean and South\u00a0Africa, and people in each part of the world\u00a0adapted it for their own use. In the North American Moravian Church the candle\u00a0services just before Christmas are very popular and beeswax candles with red\u00a0ribbon are still used.<\/p>\n

However this Candle Service developed quite differently in the British Moravian Church, and by 1903 there were Christingle services held (the first one held at Fulneck was in around 1930). The Christingle consists of an\u00a0orange, representing the world with a lighted candle to represent Christ, the\u00a0Light of the World.\u00a0Raisins and sweets\u00a0on cocktail sticks around the candle represent God\u2019s bounty and goodness in\u00a0providing the fruits of the earth.\u00a0Red\u00a0paper, forming a frill around the base of the candle, reminds us of the blood\u00a0of Christ shed for all people on the cross at Calvary.<\/p>\n

At Fulneck the School holds Christingle Services for the pupils and\u00a0students at the end of the Christmas Term, and their is also a Christingle Service for the Former Pupils Association.\u00a0The Church holds it\u2019s Christingle Service on Christmas Eve.\u00a0The lights are dimmed as chapel servants give out the\u00a0Christingles to all the children. In this timeless moment in the darkened church the visual symbol of the Christingle expresses the truth that in the\u00a0darkness of the world there shines a great light \u2013 Jesus Christ \u2013 and that he is at the heart of all of our Christmas celebrations.<\/p>\n

Everyone is welcome\u00a0to join us at 6pm on Christmas Eve for our Christingle Service.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Photo by Claire Newman Many people have heard of Christingles and Christingle Services have\u00a0become very popular in Churches at Christmas time, but few people realise that\u00a0it originates in the Moravian Church. The origins of the Christingle can be traced back to Marienborn Moravian Church in Germany on 20th December 1747.\u00a0At a\u00a0children\u2019s service hymns were sung … Continue reading Christingle<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":30,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-114","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fulneck.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fulneck.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fulneck.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fulneck.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fulneck.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=114"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/www.fulneck.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/114\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2442,"href":"http:\/\/www.fulneck.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/114\/revisions\/2442"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fulneck.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/30"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fulneck.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}