Holy Days, Holy Seasons
“I will create new heavens and a new earth.
The former things will not be remembered,
nor will they come to mind.”
--Isaiah 65.17
Holiday. A holiday is a Holy Day, a festival day set-aside for people to celebrate a sacred happening. Some Holy Days spread themselves out into a series of days. Several of the world’s major religions have holy seasons during this time of the calendar year. Let's conclude this week with another holiday tradition.
During the week from Christmas to New Year’s, there is a festival called Kwanzaa. This celebration is a faith-based observance primarily celebrated by many North Americans of West African descent. A seven-branched candelabrum is used to call the celebrants to focus on important attributes for living life with integrity. The attributes include the following: unity, self-determination, responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity and faith. Each day of the festival another candle is lit and participants focus on the meaning of one of these characteristics.
New festivals emerge in culture, often rooted in old traditions. It is important to learn about them and understand their significance. Taking the time to incorporate the unfamiliar with our time-honored traditions, we may very well find a meaning of the text for today. The characteristics examined during Kwanzaa deserve special attention in every person’s life.
If you have friends of West African descent, you may want to take time and learn from them about their “festival of light” known as Kwanzaa.
--Ben Keckler
12.03.10
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