Question: Regarding Advent Candles, how important is it to have the "correct" colours for the advent candles? I can find the white and the pink, but am unable to find a deep pink/red/purple one for Christmas. I know the Lutheran Church in our area uses blue and white. I think the minister said it had something to do with separating Advent and Lent so the colors didn't confuse people? ## Answer: Hmm, white and pink with a red Christmas candle is a new combination for me... I'm used to four purples and a white, with the radical Catholic part of me leaning toward three purples, a pink, and a white. Some Swedish Lutherans -- the inventors of the Advent Wreath -- are surprised that the candles are any colour but white. And many Lutherans use four blue candles. My Metis mother-in-law uses Red, Yellow, Blue and Green because those are the colours of the Four Corners of the Earth on a Medicine Wheel. The advent wreath is just a custom, not a doctrine or tradition, so do whatever works to create more reverence and devotion in your home. Blue paraments is a Lutheran thing -- and good liturgy, since purple is for penance, and Advent is more preparatory than penitential (although all preparation has a penitential aspect). It does have some historical basis, along with other obscure colours like rose-pink paraments for festivals of the Blessed Virgin and black paraments for Ash Wednesday; although I don't know whether any of those less-common colours have historical basis in the non-Roman catholic churches.