Talk:Altar candle

This needs to be amplified to reflect usage in other Christian traditions. Also, it's hard to imagine that Vatican II and its accompanying liturgical changes don't affect the rules statedin this article.

I am pretty sure the Vatican council didn't change the rules significantly, besides adding on other exceptions, which I unfortunately do not have. And if you have information on uses in other Christian traditions, add it, because I don't. For that matter, it should probably have uses in non-Christian traditions, too. I'll do the framework for that. -Amarkov ^babble 15:30, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Sadly, while I am interested in the liturgical usages of other Christian Denominations, i cannot really help here. However I can say that there were some changes with regards to the usages of candles on the altar. For one thing, the bishop was always allowed one extra for all of his ceremonies to what priests were. So at a high mass with a bishop there were always 7 rather than 6 candles burning on the altar. Fortescue in his book on the rituals of the roman rite (described) mentions that the tradition of lighting a candle after the consecration was one that was more honoured in the breach than in the observance. Even previous to V.II this "rite" of candle lighting was not highly used. Admittedly since the recent publication of the new edition of Fortescue, there has been renewed interest in the lighting of that candle in certain parishes of the Tridentine rite. (not all mind you). This article could be expanded even in the catholic setting be incorporating the two articles on candles and candle sticks in the Catholic Encyclopaedia (as I am planning on doing). It would be nice to have more information from the other liturgical denominations tho. As it would be from the wiccans and pagans (as they also use altar candles). In terms of the liturgical denominations it is possible that the Anglican Church will have infmrnaiton about their historical use of candes on the Justus-Anglican website, however im not too sure about the Lutherans and their use of candles along with the low church/presbyterian/methodist groups. Pax! --Ithillion (talk) 05:35, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

I added a section on Eastern Orthodox practice and added a little on Protestant practice (though I don't have much info on the latter). I also expanded the intro and did a little cleanup on the Roman Catholic section. MishaPan (talk) 19:39, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Certain protestant denominations, particularly Lutheran denominations and the United Methodist Church use altar candles as well. I think this is worth being mentioned in the article. --Willthacheerleader18 (talk) 23:52, 18 September 2010 (UTC)