The Night Office: Embracing the Creative Power of Darkness

With lights and ever more lights, we drive the holiness and the beauty of night back to the forests and the sea …      Henry Beston, “Night on a Great Beach” (1928)

 How does darkness influence our art, our prayer, our perspective? Given the explosion of artificial light over the past 150 years, how do we navigate the loss of darkness and what—exactly—are we losing? In this panel, we’ll explore ways to enrich our creative practices through mindful engagement with darkness, literal and metaphorical. We’ll also explore the profound effects artificial light has on the natural world, and our accompanying grief. We hope to converse across theology, ecology, poetry and non-fiction, touching on such topics as winter solstice, via negativa, midnight prayer (‘the night office’), and the importance of the night sky.

---

Presenters: Hannah Larrabee, Nina MacLaughlin, Carolyn Oliver, and Matthew E. Henry