st. lucy's commemoration

[FireDragon76]

Today we had a commemoration of St. Lucy and St. Nicholas. We tend to do this every year.

I am not familiar with St. Lucy- she's not very prominent in the Orthodox church.

This sunday, we had something that was like a miniature version of this:

It is definitely a pre-Reformation custom, when religion was less rationalized, and often focused on veneration of saints as immediate mediators to God, with people expressing personal devotion in ways that would be foreign to many Protestants. St. Lucy could well be an example of a cult of a saint that has survived the Reformation.

We even sang a carol about St. Lucy, translated into English, of course. And we also ate some cookies and buns passed out by the little kids dressed in white.

 

[Kalevalatar]

We celebrated Luciadagen (Lucia Day), December 13th, yesterday. A national official Lucia and many local Lucias were crowned and we had Lucia processions -- it's a bit of like a Miss Finland competition, almost, among the Swedish-speaking Finns, as Lucia is a Scandinavian tradition. This is the darkest time of the year. Even here in southern Finland we have no more than five hours of daylight and above the Arctic Circle, it's polar night. Lucia, with her candle crown, means light (Lucia as in lux), so it's a particularly nice tradition at this time of year.

Here's a picture gallery from the Helsinki Cathedral's official Lucia ceremonies.

Finland's Special Lucia makes her debut

Lucia procession at the Turku Cathedral:

Foto: Andrea Wiklund/ÅU