Question about Candlemass

[Mystic_Banana]

It used to be traditional to leave Christmas decorations up until Candlemass (2nd February) but when did this tradition decline?

It’s still kept as an optional for if you leave them up past 6th of Jan - it’s not that well known as a practice, but it *is * known… we’ve left them until then a couple of times, and I have to say… last time, the Christmas tree was beginning to feel like the uncle who stayed over and wouldn’t go away…

Talking of which, any idea when we (in the UK at least) are supposed to take down our deccies this year? Epiphany is on Sunday, so are we supposed to keep them up until then? Don’t think it’s the kind of thing they write canon law about…

 

[poche]

59 is still a kid, by the way… and we also take ours down January 6, “Little Christmas.”

Funny you should mention ‘Little Christmas.’ I heard that the 25th of the month could be celebrated as a little Christmas.

 

[Phemie]

Yes that occurs when Epiphany is celebrated on Jan. 6th and not moved to the Sunday. Since cloistered Benedictines are not subjected to worldly constraints regarding days off, etc., they still celebrate on the 6th with the Baptism of the Lord on the Sunday. Presumably some abbeys with external apostolates may move it as well, but ours being strictly cloistered have no need to.

I’m not sure when, in Canada, the move to the Sunday occurred.

My book of Complementary Norms to the 1983 Code of Canon Law shows that the decree (Decree No. 7) on Holy Days of Obligations was promulgated on May 14, 1985. It was approved by the CCCB on October 23, 1984 and reviewed by the Apostolic See (Letter of Apostolic Nunciature, Prot. No. 20506, March 8, 1985).

The commentary notes that The CCCB has decided to retain to retain the particular legislation approved for Canada, February 14, 1968 (S.C. for the Clergy, Prot. No. 116593/D.)

 

[SMHW]

It used to be traditional to leave Christmas decorations up until Candlemass (2nd February) but when did this tradition decline?

I have a question.

What is meant by “Christmas decorations?” And are we talking about the home, the church, or both?

I ask because when I was growing up I do not remember any tradition of leaving decorations up much past New Years day, either at home or in my Parish Church. I can’t even remember if the creche was left up until the Epiphany at my childhood parish.

This was back in the early 1960s and my American diocese and parish had very strong Irish and/or Irish-American Catholic backgrounds.