Homemade Easter Candles or the Coronavirus Wins

by | Apr 6, 2020 | Catholic All Year Shop, Catholic Living, Easter, Liturgical Year, Weird Catholic Stuff | 15 comments

Easter candles, you guys. EASTER CANDLES. We must have them. And really, my family can’t imagine missing out completely on the stirringly beautiful beginning of the Easter Vigil Mass, with the fire and the candles and the Exsultet. The whole Easter Vigil is great of course, but I really love the beginning, outside in the chill of the night, warmed by the Easter fire, passing the light of Christ, and the Exsultet which is, in the opinion of this liturgical living expert, the most beautiful prayer of the year.

So, my task of the past few days has been to figure out how to make an Easter Candle at home, sans artistic talent of the drawing/painting variety. I did it. I am amazed at how well they turned out and how very very easy they were and I’m really looking forward to having an Easter Candle as part of our domestic church celebration.

You want one too, right?! Here’s how to do it.

Note: Please be careful with candles. They can set things on fire. We never leave our candles burning unsupervised.

You’ll need

  • A candle
  • White gift wrap tissue paper or kleenex-type facial tissue
  • A printer and white printer paper
  • Scotch tape and scissors
  • Wax paper or parchment paper
  • A heat gun or hair dryer
  • A design for your candle
  • Extra credit: 5 grains of incense or whole cloves to place into the candle at your family Easter Vigil candle lighting!

If you’re more of a visual learner, here’s a video tutorial.

Get a candle

According to precepts for liturgical use, a paschal candle “should be made of wax, never be artificial, be renewed each year, be only one in number, and be of sufficiently large size that it may convey the truth that Christ is the light of the world.” Those of us playing along at home are not bound by these rules, but they are good guidelines. Of course, in circumstances in which we aren’t able to afford and/or obtain a large beeswax candle, any candle will do!

Choose your design and size

The design for an Easter candle is very specific. The main design element must be a cross. It has an Alpha symbol above it and an Omega symbol below it. It must have the year, either below the Omega, or with one digit in each corner of the cross. Then it can have some decorative elements of one’s own choosing.

Make something on the computer, hand draw it, or use one of my designs from the shop here.

My set comes with three designs: Red Scroll, Flora, and Celtic. Each design comes formatted for a pillar, a votive, and a taper. Select “print actual size” to get the formatted size. Whatever design you end up using, I suggest printing it out low quality b&w on scratch paper first to check the sizing. Then choose “custom scale” or “percent” to increase or decrease the size of the printed image as needed.

The easiest way to end up with an Easter Candle

Print a pillar size design out in color on a piece of printer paper, wrap it around a glass votive jar candle, trim the excess, tape it down, and be done.

The candle on the left is just regular printer paper, taped on. The two others are printed on tissue paper and affixed with a glue stick. Updated to add: a reader commented on FB that she made a jar candle with a printer paper label last year and the paper caught fire through the glass. She thought it was a fluke due to the wick floating over against the glass. But she wanted to warn everyone that it can happen. I have burned the tissue paper kind without incident, myself. But we don’t leave them unattended, just in case.

The more complicated but still pretty easy and super cool looking way

Cut a piece of white gift wrap tissue to 8×10.5. Center it on a piece of printer paper SHINY SIDE UP. Carefully tape it down with scotch tape, making sure to cover the corners and at least two inches along the center of each of the four sides. Load it into your printer so that the tissue paper side will get printed on. (Don’t know? Draw an X on one side of a piece of scratch paper, load it X up, and see which side the printing comes out on.) Print your design.

Cut it out

Using your scissors, cut out the design you wish to use, making sure to trim off any tissue paper that would hang over the edge of the candle or overlap. A rectangle shape with white space is fine. If your candle is curved or angled, trim excess tissue paper to get it to lay flat with no overlap.

Place it on the candle

It might take some fiddling to get the lines to match up in the back.

Heat it

Wrap the candle with the tissue paper layer in a piece of wax paper or parchment paper. Hold it smooth and tight across the candle by grabbing the excess in your fist at the back of the candle. (You might wish to wear a glove or protect your hand with a tea towel or shirt.) Using a heat gun or hair dryer, moving back and forth, melt the candle a tiny bit to allow the tissue paper to soak very slightly into the wax. You’ll be able to see a slight color change. Once one side is set, open the wax paper and adjust the candle to heat another side. You can put the finishing touches on it just laying on the wax paper, and rolling it a bit, rather than holding it. Be careful not to melt the candle too much. Nothing happens, then all of a sudden everything happens.

And that’s it!

If you don’t have access to gift wrap tissue, kleenex type facial tissue works well too. Just separate it to one ply, tape it down to a piece of printer paper, and print and cut and wrap and heat just the same. A kleenex won’t quite fit all the way around a 3 in pillar candle, but it’s pretty close and will work in a pinch!

Once you have your Paschal/Easter Candle made, be sure to use it for a stirring At Home Lucernarium on Holy Saturday night. See the prayer online here (lay people don’t say the part in parentheses.) Or see the booklet included in the set with the candle transfers. It features a blessing of an Easter fire and the candle, and the Exsultet. Then the candle can be lit during family prayer time throughout Easter and the whole year, as long as it lasts. As soon as it’s possible, the DIY Easter Candle should be blessed by a priest. If you have access to a priest’s blessing before Easter, you can also ask him to bless the candle before it is used. If you’re able to attend an Easter Vigil Mass, you can still create and use an Easter candle for your home! Before the Easter Vigil next year, this year’s candle should be used, melted, or buried and replaced with a new candle.

This booklet contains an at Home Lucernarium rite for the Vigil of Easter, including a blessing of the Easter fire and paschal candle, and the exsultet. (The liturgy of the Word, the Baptismal liturgy, and the liturgy of the Eucharist are not included).

The Lucernarium is the first of the four parts of the Easter Vigil Mass. It begins 45 minutes to an hour after sunset, to make sure that it’s good and dark. Outside the church, an Easter fire is kindled. The rubrics call for a “blazing fire” (rogus ardens)! The fire is blessed by the priest, and the paschal candle is marked by the priest, and then lit from the fire. The candle is processed into the dark church by the deacon, then members of the congregation light their individual candles from the paschal candle, and then light the candles of others, and so the light of Christ is shared.

Once the paschal candle is in its place on the altar and all are in the church with their individual candles, the lights of the church are turned on and the Exsultet or Easter Proclamation is sung, chanted, or recited before the paschal/Easter candle, ideally by a deacon. In the absence of a deacon, it may be sung by a cantor, with a few sections excluded.

For families unable to attend the Easter Vigil Mass, some of the majesty of this stirring ceremony can be recreated at home. A family lucinarium could begin with an outdoor bonfire, which can be blessed by the head of the household. (This isn’t the same as the blessing of a priest, but is acceptable if a priest is not present.) If that’s not possible, the ceremony can begin inside a darkened house with a presentation and lighting of the family Easter candle, a procession of the candle to its place in the home, and the singing/chanting/recitation of the non-deacon version of the Exsultet.

It’s not going to be a usual Easter. I’m going to miss our church and our priests and our friends and THE SACRAMENTS. But at least we will have the light of Christ in our home. And the Exsultet!

If you make an Easter candle, I’d love to see it! If you use the hashtag #catholicallyear it will come up in my feed, or tag me in the post. Or email me at helpdesk@catholicallyear.com with your photo. And have a very happy and holy Holy Week.

Easter Sunday at Home Dry Mass Booklet {Digital Download} + FREE Printing & Shipping Available

Act of Spiritual Communion, Act of Contrition, Morning Offering Set 

Blessing of a Bonfire Booklet of Prayers, Blessings & Bible Readings {Digital Download}

Holy Week Meal and Activity Planner ($1)

15 Comments

  1. Deirdre Henry

    What a wonderful tutorial. You are blest with creative ideas and I hope I can make an Easter candle like yours.
    Thank you for showing how to do this and wishing you and yours a very Happy and Holy Easter.
    Deirdre

  2. Dill

    I love this! We specifically built a firepit to celebrate the Lucenarium, and were thinking we’d just use our baptismal candles. This is a great idea. Thanks for the resources!

  3. Alana Despins

    These are so beautiful! I was wondering if you might consider including an option for B&W printers for your printables? (Maybe too late for this one, but for future offerings?) I’d love to be able to add color myself afterwards of course, but shades of solid grey do make it more difficult 😉 .

    And THANK YOU for sharing all you do with us all. Your blog is by far my favorite on the internet! 🙂

    • Kendra

      The red scroll version prints well in black and white!

  4. Kat

    I’m sorry but, as the daughter of a fireman, my mind is screaming, “please do not wrap paper around a candle and then light it!!”

    • Kendra

      I only recommended using regular printer paper as a wrap around a glass jar candle, where it won’t contact the fire. The tissue paper transfer gets sublimated into the candle wax and burns exactly the same as a regular candle, no sparks or flames or anything.

  5. Dessica Mabry

    Thank you so much for this Kendra! I have had an extra, never lit, white pillar candle hanging around since before Christmas. I didn’t know at the time what prompted me to buy it, but now I know that it was the Holy Spirit nudging me to be prepared. God Bless you and your beautiful family!

  6. Marian

    We make an Easter candle every year, generally following your easy suggestion. I grab the glass jar pillar candles from dollar tree, cut out the cross, letters, and numbers, modge podge on the pieces, and then we use super glue to add five brads for the five wounds of Christ. The whole process takes maybe an hour (because I cut each of the numbers and letters out individually), so I really hope others will try it! My kids love lighting the candle at every meal during Easter.

  7. Virginia

    What do the alpha and omega symbols represent on the Easter candle?

    • Kendra

      The Greek letters alpha and omega signify that God is the beginning and the end.

  8. Marion

    Kendra wishing you and your family A Blessed Holy Week and A Happy,Joyous Easter.
    Marion

  9. Marilyn

    Have A Blessed Holy Week and A Happy Easter filled with Joy.
    Mariyn

  10. Joanne

    I’ve made Paschal candles using paint for years. This year, I’m doing this! Thank you for the great idea! I will be asking my hubby, who’s a deacon to sing the Exsultet at home on Saturday since we won’t be attending the Vigil and that is by far my favorite part. 🙁

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Hi! I’m Kendra.

For twenty years now, I’ve been using food, prayer, and conversation based around the liturgical calendar to share the lives of the saints and the beautiful truths and traditions of our Catholic faith. My own ten children, our friends and neighbors, and people just like you have been on this journey with me.

If you’d like to learn more about what Catholics believe and why, and to be inspired by saints from every era all over the world, you’ve come to the right place. If you’re feeling overwhelmed with the prospect of how to teach your kids about the faith in a way that’s true, engaging, and lasts a lifetime, we can help!

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