What is this great "Paschal Candle" that stands in our midst?    Why does our great "Paschal Candle" seem always to be burning during the Fifty Days of Easter?

The "Paschal Candle" is the "Pillar of Fire" by which God led the children of Israel from slavery to freedom, through the dusty desert to the land flowing with milk and honey! (Exodus 13:21-22;  14:19;  24).        Behind our "Pillar of Fire", we marched freed from sin from the gloom of exile back into our church's house during the Easter Vigil.    With our "Pillar of Fire", we led those chosen for the Sacraments of Initiation of new life to the font of Baptism that is both tomb and womb, and to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit by the laying on of hands and anointing with Sacred Chrism.     

The "Paschal Candle" also is the holy sign of the Risen Christ, our Light.    (Thanks be to God!)     As we sang during the Easter Vigil in the darkened church with only our lit candles shining bright:   "This is the night when the Pillar of Fire destroyed the darkness of sin!     This is the night when Christians washed clean of sin and freed from all defilement, are restored to grace and grow together in Holiness.    This is the night when Jesus Christ broke the chains of death and rose triumphant from the grave . . . O happy the fault of Adam!   O necessary sin of Adam, which gained for us so great a Redeemer . . . Night truly blessed when heaven is wedded to earth, and man is reconciled with God! . . . Accept this Easter Candle.   May it always dispel the darkness of this night!" (Exsultet).   

On our great "Pillar of Fire", we traced the sign of Christ yesterday, today and forever, the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega.    Into it, we pressed five jeweled-grains of incense that represent the five wounds on the divine hands feet and side of Christ Jesus.    For it, we sang out song of consecration and praise:    "Accept, O God, this Easter Candle.    Let is shine with the lights of heaven and bravely burn forever!"(Exsultet).   From it, we take our own light, a flame divided but undimmed.    All who are baptized walk in its glow.

For the Fifty Days of Easter our "Paschal Candle" shines gloriously in the Assembly of the Gathered Church.    Then, held in a place of honor near the Baptismal Font, our "Paschal Candle" is brought forth and lit for every evening sacrifice of praise, for every Baptism and every Funeral.    It is lit for every birth into the Community of Faith, and for every birth into eternal life.     As the days and the seasons turn, slowly this Pillar of Finest Wax and this strongest wick is consumed, burned down, eaten-up by fire, sacrificed --- like Christ Jesus Himself --- and yet never truly extinguished.     And so our "Pillar of Fire" measures our days and our seasons until it is Easter again, when once more we sing in the light of a new "Paschal Candle".   "May the Morning Star which never sets find this flame still burning:  Christ the Morning Star, Who came back from the dead and shed His peaceful light on all people." (Exsultet).      Thanks be to God!