This is cross-posted as my weekly editorial at Blogher. Find all my BlogHer columns here.

“So the Christians and the Pagans sat together at the table
Finding faith and common ground the best that they were able
Lighting trees in darkness, learning new ways from the old, and
Making sense of history and drawing warmth out of the cold.”

Dar Williams
The Christians and the Pagans

“It’s dark out now, but the light is coming.” This is the message that the Pagan celebration of Winter Solstice (Dec 21st) and the Christian celebration of Christmas (Dec 25th) has in common. As the days grow short, we long for light — both physical and metaphysical, to carry us through the dark season. Advent, which means simply “to come,” is the season that leads up to both the Pagan tradition of celebrating the return of the Life-Giver, the Sun; and the Christian tradition of celebrating the birth of the Son, Jesus, who in religious parlance is often referred to as “the light of the world.” The Advent wreath, which has it’s finger in both tradition’s pies, is a simple practice that brings warmth, meaning and light to the holiday season. And the good news is, it’s easy to practice!

The Advent Wreath at it’s roots is an ancient Pagan rite. In the Pagan era people would bring their cart wheels indoors during the Winter, to preserve this important tool of survival from the wet and the cold. The wheels were hung from the ceiling and used and impromptu chandeliers. As the days grew short and the nights lengthened, people would deck the wheels out with evergreens and candles and spin them as an incantation to the Powers, asking that the light be returned. And what do you know? As the longest night of the Winter Solstice tipped the world towards Spring, the days started to lengthen and the light came back!

In the Christian era this practice was adopted by the church. (Most, if not all Christian traditions find their roots in other religions.) A wreath of evergreens is laid on a table (or here in Denmark, hung from the ceiling) and filled with four candles — one for each week of the waiting, or Advent, season. Originally the candles were simply a countdown, one for each of the four Sunday’s preceding Christmas. Now, in liturgical churches the candles are different colors and have different themes. The colors and meanings are not standardized across denominations (e.g. branches) of the Christian church. But generally the colors are purple, rose, and white and the themes are Hope, Love, Joy, and Peace. (For more info, click here.)

You can easily use a wreath to bring attentiveness and meaning into your home this holiday season. Buy a wreath at your local store, and lay it on your table. You might want to put something protective beneath it like a large platter or even just a couple sheets of wax paper, trimmed to fit. Place four candles inside the wreath–or five if you want a separate one to light on Solstice Day or Christmas Day. Gather your family, friends, or your own dear self to the table once a week (usually a Sunday), light the candle are read something meaningful. Here are two inter-faith suggestions that I’ve used as an officiate at both Solstice and Christmas celebrations:

Soon, our nights grow shorter and our days grow long.
We look once more on these earthy symbols–
firelight and evergreens–
and embrace the glow of hope
That Light and Life will return once again to the earth.

——

The people who lived in darkness have seen a great light,
and we have beheld its glory,

Light,
generous from the inside out,
true from start to finish,
full of grace, full of truth.

As each week draws us closer to these celebrations of Light, the light from the wreath literally grows brighter and stronger, chasing the shadows to the corners and providing us with hope. I find it to be a powerful symbol of a universal truth: the light comes into the darkness, and the darkness cannot overcome it.

What will you do to celebrate the Light’s return? Please add your ideas and links to the comments below.

More Magpie Girl about Advent, Solstice, and Christmas:

Sacred Sunday: A Prayer for Solstice and Advent

Beautiful Pagan-y Things: Feast of the Winter Solstice with the Fremont Arts Council

Poetry: Bread of the Winter Solstice

A Winter Soltice Gone Amiss (But Still, a Good Plan)

Today’s Theme: Peaceful Advent

God with Us: Brennan Manning

The cover from my current journal, made with a postcard of Picasso’s “The Old Guitarist”–my personal icon of mourning.

I am coming to the realization that I have two functional weeks a month. Otherwise the pain level is too severe. I can’t write well when I’m this foggy.

For awhile there, for a beautiful hopeful season, I was in better remission and I had most of the month free and clear. But now, it’s back to just two weeks. If it gets worse, if it gets to be more than this, I’ll have to fly home and see my super special Dr. Woo-Woo and get back on top of this. You all have to hold me accountable to this okay? If I’m out of it more than two weeks a month you have to say, “Rachelle, it’s worth the money. Fly home. Spend a week or two on Dr. Lewis’ treatment table.”

Chronic pain is such a complex creature. It is a large part of your life, but it is not your life. It is a big part of you, but it is not who you are. Living within those paradoxical realities is challenging, perhaps as challenging as figuring out the physical bits and pieces of it–the medicines and the food allergies and the exercise and sleep needs and all the more attainable nuts and bolt-ness of it all.

I’ve wanted to write something about this for while. Something like Nicholas Wolterstorff’s Lament of a Son which not a self-help book, but the author’s story about the death of his son. The telling itself though, is helpful. The telling itself is the companionship for the journey.

In the beautiful children’s book Frida, the author says “she turned her pain into something beautiful.” I’d like to do that. I’d like to tell true things – stories that are also helpful.

I don’t know why I always leap to the idea of a book, when clearly articles and essays are my most natural length. (I just get so distracted by sparkly things, and without a real deadline I skip from project to project. This is not a boon to my agent.) At any rate, maybe an article would be more reasonable here….maybe something for The Sun. I have a couple little bits that might turn into something. This one for instance, or this artsy bit here, or here. Or maybe these more practical stories. And then there is what I wrote this morning, based on an image that came to me while I was doing Shavasana on the living room floor:

I offer this pain to you on a gilt platter.
No, held aloft in a silver bowl.
I give it to you coiled, or swirling and boiling.
A dark depth. An oily surface.

What will you do then,
with this pain that drains from the trinity of my eyes and the bridge of my nose?
What will you make of this dark offering?

Play us out Sister Alanis.

That’s my daughter in the water….