Christians everywhere use light to signal the coming of Christ, the light of the world.

The advent candles represent Hope, Love, Joy and Peace. In India clay oil lamps are placed in household windows; and in Sweden, Lucia appears throughout the country with candles in her hair while houses and businesses have windows with electric white advent candles. Of course, in the USA and now Australia, house lights play an important part.

There are some gorgeous public light displays around the world and it would be fun to go on a holiday incorporating some. Just to mention a few: Champs-Elysées, Newport Beach Christmas Boat Parade, and even Canberra.

Christmas trees began in 18th century Germany and spread to the US via England. These were real trees with ornaments, lit for a short time with candles. People loved these but it was lots of work to light and extinguish these candles; and they were a fire hazard.

Thomas Edison patented the light bulb in 1880, and soon his associate, Johnson, hand made a string of 80 red, white and blue lights in the shape of cones and put them on the tree. This tree drew large crowds and he kept increasing the number of lights each year. Remember this was a time when few houses had electricity, but he still sold strings of 16 lights for big money. You can see pictures of these lights on the Smithsonian site.

By the 1930s many families could afford to buy tree lights. In the 1960s when I was a child I remember most families in the neighbourhood put up outdoor lights as well, and now these are common everywhere. Today’s lights are not as big or as bright but the displays are certainly spectacular.

We certainly appreciate all the houses in Yass that are so beautifully lit. It has become a Christmas tradition for our family to join the cars touring around Yass on Christmas evening and often a few times before then as well. Thanks to all of you that make this a special time for us.

I wish you a bright Christmas and a good new year.