Lighting of Candles Prior to Mass

[Traddy1962]

I don’t know that it changed with the N.O., but the lighting of the candles was done in a specific order. Everything done in the mass, or concerning it, has a purpose and was intended to be done in a specific manner. The lighting starts on the epistle side closest to the tabernacle and goes out. Then go to the gospel side and start at the tabernacle going out.
Extinguishing them is done in the reverse order.
I’m pretty sure the 1962 Missale Romanum has an illustration for lighting the candles.

 

[CatholicZ09]

When I was an altar server, I always lit the candles before the church became relatively full. There was something about having the congregation watch me light them that unnerved me, so I always tried to do it early but not too early (our finance person didn’t like spending money on candles, so I would’ve been chastised had I lit them too early. LOL.)

There was always the occasional, “Oh, crap, no one lit the candles,” at some Masses during the processional hymn. Good times.

As far as order goes, none existed to my knowledge. Sometimes, I started at our tabernacle and then went to the altar, sometimes reverse that.

 

[dochawk]

(our finance person didn’t like spending money on candles,

we (byzantine) have a pair of small candles at each side preparation table in the Holy Place, and four more outside the iconostasis.

I’ve replaced more than a couple during liturgy when they went out.

Afterwards, when I find one with too little wax to survive another liturgy, I pour it’s now wet wax into another (but have to be careful not to add to much, given the height of the wick).

And in the back of my head, a voice says, “really? You just save thirty cents?”


[The eastern norm is men, not boys. We’re filling in for the subdeacons that are so hard to catch these days . . .]