Summer is waning

Day after day, the sunset comes a little earlier. We do not often realize it, but summer is a period of decline; the day's length peaks the first day of summer, and goes into decline until the winter solstice.

Conversely, winter comes when daylight is at its weakest, and on every day that follows winter's debut, the day grows a little longer.

The symbolism of our religious celebrations take on great meaning when you consider the seasons in that light. Christmas and Hannukah come when darkness is at its apex. For the Jews, Hannukah is the festival of lights, celebrating a lamp that would not go out in the time of the Maccabeans. And for Christians, Christmas is a celebration of the coming of the light upon which the darkness has never prevailed.

Easter and Passover come around the time of the vernal equinox, in the spring. Passover celebrates the delivery of the Israelites from the darkness of bondage, and Easter celebrates the final victory of light over dark, when death itself is handed its irreversible defeat. How wonderful that each is celebrated just as the sun begins to shine for the better part of the day! :-)

So perhaps it is OK for the sun to set. She always rises again, bringing light over the dark, "God's recreation of the new day."