POLITICS: Beautiful St. Lucia’s Day Traditions From Europe

This article was originally published on PJ Media.

Today is the feast of St. Lucy or Santa Lucia, a day that Christians in some European countries have long celebrated with festivals and inspiring local traditions that can add luster to any Christmas season, here in America just as across the Atlantic.

St. Lucy was a wealthy and beautiful young woman of Greek ancestry in Sicily, martyred in the early 4th century for turning down a prominent suitor, dedicating her virginity to God, and refusing to abandon her faith. For centuries, Catholics and later other Christians in Nordic countries and Italy developed unique ways of honoring Lucy and the light of God that shone so brightly in her life, even amid the dark and cold hours of wintertime.

Lucy used to wear candles on her head, it is said, to light her way as she secretly brought food to Christians in need during the nighttime. Before being martyred, Lucy was tortured by having her eyes torn out, but tradition says that her sight was miraculously restored before her death. These incidents, combined with the fact that her name comes from the Latin word for light (lux, lucis), led to her patronage of those with eye problems, and her association with light.

Lights were and are an important part of celebrations for Lucy in Norway and Sweden, where there is very little light throughout much of the winter. Indeed, there, it is traditional for a girl or woman per household to dress in a white gown (for purity) with a red sash (for martyrdom), wearing a wreath with candles in it on her head, to bring sweet baked treats (usually saffron buns) to the family in the darkness of early morning, singing as she goes, just as St. Lucy wore candles and brought food to the Christians at night.

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This tradition also has a double meaning in Sweden, as a famine there was once alleviated miraculously when a ship sailed into the Vänern lake carrying a white-robed woman shining with light and a supply of food.

According to Catholic News World:

In Sweden and Norway, a girl is chosen to lead the Church procession with crown of candles. Similarly dressed girls (tärnor) and boys wearing a tall pointed hat carrying a star wand (stjärngossar) and follow her. Together they sing beautiful carols… Once the singing is over, the procession enjoy coffee and saffron-flavored buns called lussekatter.

Lucy isn’t just a popular saint in Scandinavia but in Italy, too, which makes sense since she was from Sicily.

A picture of me in 2008, dressed as Santa Lucia

Just as in Sweden, St. Lucy once saved her hometown from famine. In the 17th century, on St. Lucy‘s Day, the starving people of Syracuse, Sicily, received a welcome gift: a cargo of wheat arriving in the port. The hungry people immediately took the grain home and boiled it. That gave rise to the traditional St. Lucy’s Day dish, as explained by Best of Sicily:

[The] main dish is called cuccìa (pronounced koo-chì-ya), and it is made from wheat berries, which have been soaked in water for a few days, and boiled for hours until soft and creamy…[because the] people were starving and that they could not wait to eat, they just took the wheat home, and ate it boiled, without grinding it and turning it into flour first in order to make bread or pasta. [And thus was born a tradition.]

Syracuse also traditionally has a procession with a statue of Lucy and her relics.

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In some parts of Italy, St. Lucy is like her fellow saint Nicholas (Santa Claus) in that she brings children presents. Italian Traditions explains:

In Vicenza children usually leave a shoe outside the window, along with a piece of bread, for the Saint, and a little milk for her donkey. In the province of Bergamo, however, the gifts are expected only after having written and delivered the letter to the church of Santa Lucia, in via XX Settembre. In Sicily, on the other hand, especially in the areas of Palermo, it is customary to totally banish bread, pasta and derivatives. The protagonist of the day is rice, used to prepare “la [cuccia]” …and the famous arancini.

Try out one of these traditions today or sometime during the Christmas season to honor St. Lucy and Christ for whom she died. After all, while St. Lucy is the saint of light, it is only because she loved Jesus, Who is the Light of the World (John 8:12).