Candlelight at Cincinnati Bible College: excerpt from Singing from Silence
The Candlelight was a campus ritual that crystallized the marriage mill mentality of the seminary milieu, blending the suspense of a sorority pledge announcement with the sentimental overtones of a bridal shower. A close friend of the girl recently affianced would post the date and time of the Candlelight all over campus. The identity of the lucky girl would be a close secret. The event would usually be held in the lounge of one of the two women’s dorms. The girls attending (only girls, no men allowed) would form a circle. The friend would begin the proceedings with prayer or devotions. She would solemnly light a candlestick, decorated with flowers and bound with ribbon to an engagement ring. As the girls sang sentimental choruses, the lit candle would be passed from hand to hand in the circle until it reached the girl who had been affianced. When the candle reached her, she would blow it out and place the ring on her finger. An engagement was announced. A woman’s life was pronounced worthy of living. Tears, hugs, screams.
The male equivalent of the Candlelight was called a Swirly. It involved several dorm mates catching the lucky guy, dragging him to the john, ducking his head in the toilet, and flushing.
Although I cry easily when I’m touched, I’d say I was never a very sentimental girl. I’ve never sent greeting cards and rarely write letters. If people can’t tell how I feel about them by how I treat them face to face, I figure shame on me. I attended a few Candlelights to be polite. I regarded the ritual with cynicism. When is a candlestick just a candlestick, I wondered. How maddening to watch these women’s career opportunities go up in flames so they could get their coveted MRS degree. The thought of a Candlelight could nauseate me. If I ever screamed at a Candlelight -- and I’m not saying I didn’t -- it was not from joy but from sheer exasperation.
Rather than attend the Candlelight, I’d just as soon have gifted a recently engaged girl with a Swirly to wake her up a bit, if I only had the nerve and a few similarly inclined others to help me out. But I was pretty much the only one who felt as strongly about it, and I wasn’t very big.
Around the same time that Richard was getting pressure from the guys in the Men‘s dorm, I was being interrogated by the girls in my own dorm. After Richard had sung his songs and played piano for a devotional in my dorm, their initial indifference to Richard and me had been overcome by curiosity.
The girls of Alumni Hall demanded to know what the nature of my relationship with Richard was; whether we were dating, whether we ever would date, was I in love with him, could I ever be in love with him, and so forth. We had deliberately left the relationship between us undefined, so I was initially at a loss to answer their questions.
Singing from Silence by Pamela Richards, @ 2012
Click here and scroll down for a page from the CBC 1974-1975 yearbook describing a Candlelight ceremony.
The male equivalent of the Candlelight was called a Swirly. It involved several dorm mates catching the lucky guy, dragging him to the john, ducking his head in the toilet, and flushing.
Although I cry easily when I’m touched, I’d say I was never a very sentimental girl. I’ve never sent greeting cards and rarely write letters. If people can’t tell how I feel about them by how I treat them face to face, I figure shame on me. I attended a few Candlelights to be polite. I regarded the ritual with cynicism. When is a candlestick just a candlestick, I wondered. How maddening to watch these women’s career opportunities go up in flames so they could get their coveted MRS degree. The thought of a Candlelight could nauseate me. If I ever screamed at a Candlelight -- and I’m not saying I didn’t -- it was not from joy but from sheer exasperation.
Rather than attend the Candlelight, I’d just as soon have gifted a recently engaged girl with a Swirly to wake her up a bit, if I only had the nerve and a few similarly inclined others to help me out. But I was pretty much the only one who felt as strongly about it, and I wasn’t very big.
Around the same time that Richard was getting pressure from the guys in the Men‘s dorm, I was being interrogated by the girls in my own dorm. After Richard had sung his songs and played piano for a devotional in my dorm, their initial indifference to Richard and me had been overcome by curiosity.
The girls of Alumni Hall demanded to know what the nature of my relationship with Richard was; whether we were dating, whether we ever would date, was I in love with him, could I ever be in love with him, and so forth. We had deliberately left the relationship between us undefined, so I was initially at a loss to answer their questions.
Singing from Silence by Pamela Richards, @ 2012
Click here and scroll down for a page from the CBC 1974-1975 yearbook describing a Candlelight ceremony.