Worldwide Candle Lighting...

A special event will be taking place on Sunday, December 11 at 7:00 PM. It is a beautiful and deeply meaningful event that is held around the world.  From the Compassionate Friends website:

Anticipation of a very special and memorable day grows as the 15th Worldwide Candle Lighting December 11, 2011 nears.  The Compassionate Friends Worldwide Candle Lighting unites family and friends around the globe in lighting candles for one hour to honor and remember children who have died at any age from any cause. As candles are lit at 7 p.m. local time, creating a virtual wave of light, hundreds of thousands of persons commemorate and honor the memory of children in a way that transcends all ethnic, cultural, religious, and political boundaries.

Now believed to be the largest mass candle lighting on the globe, the Worldwide Candle Lighting, a gift to the bereavement community from The Compassionate Friends, creates a virtual 24-hour wave of light as it moves from time zone to time zone. Hundreds of formal candle lighting events are held and thousands of informal candle lightings are conducted in homes as families gather in quiet remembrance of children who have died, but will never be forgotten.

The Worldwide Candle Lighting started in the United States in 1997 as a small Internet observance but has since swelled in numbers as word has spread throughout the world of the remembrance. In 2010, information was submitted to TCF's national website on services in 15 countries outside the United States including more than 530 services, as this special day continues to grow.

I am blessed that there will be a formal candle lighting at Apex United Methodist Church, and I will be there. I would ask everyone to light a candle next Sunday at 7 PM in remembrance of Andy and of all children who left us too soon. And please hug your children for me as well.

Children we remember

Though missing from our sight

In honor and remembrance

We light candles in the night...

We will not forget

And every year in deep December

On Earth we will light candles

              As we remember

~Jacqueline Brown