An array of the faithful came together at St. Joseph Cathedral for the 100th year of World Mission Sunday, a day that celebrates the missions across the world, helping them share the gospel with those who need it most. The Cathedral stood filled with a multitude of ethnic communities from across the Diocese of Columbus.
World Mission Sunday Mass is one of my favorite Masses to photograph. There is a level of depth that comes from having many different communities come together as one, calling to mind the beauty of the universal Church.
I expected photographing this Mass to be very straightforward, like many past assignments, but our God is full of surprises! I set up my camera for the unique yellow light and brown concrete bricks and balanced the colors to offset the yellow tones with a lighter blue to create a natural cast to the environment.
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At the beginning of Mass, I swiftly walked up the right-side aisle and prepared to get a couple of shots of the plethora of priests concelebrating as they processed up the center aisle. I glanced to my left, tracking how quickly the priests were moving and how to line up the shot. Immediately, I noticed how the stained-glass window behind the procession was lighting up in ways I had never seen, because the Mass took place during golden hour.
Golden hour is the coveted hour visual artists cherish. It comes the hour before sunset, where the sun creates a shimmer of gold as far as the eye can see.
Excitement bubbled quickly inside me after seeing golden hour make its appearance. It’s rare when the light comes directly through the stained-glass windows of the Cathedral, so I took full advantage of it.
Beginning to shoot, I reveled in the radiance of the glowing window straight across from me. I thought I’d only have a few minutes with the sunlight. But as always, the Lord has more for us.
I took a quick look back and my jaw dropped. Intense light beams shone through the window behind the one I was photographing. What beauty! Because the sun was getting closer to setting, the angle at which the beams came through was a straight line, something you don’t often see.
It was as if heaven itself opened at the beginning of the Mass. I couldn’t help but grin as the scene unfolded in my viewfinder. Everyone was facing forward, attentive to the start of Mass, but I wanted to loudly tell them to look at how cool this was!
Photographing light beams is harder than you would think. I moved past my bewilderment and honed in on how to capture them. It’s tricky to highlight the rays while also having the rest of the scene lit properly. Usually, it’s one or the other.
I needed to turn up my shutter speed, the rate at which the camera takes the photo, and turn up the aperture, the size the lens is open to let in more or less light. Having a larger lens opening allowed for more light to fill the scene around the beams and having a faster shutter speed captured the individual beams as I needed.
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The light beams lined up perfectly with the architecture of the Cathedral as well, effortlessly glowing through the two pillars on either side of the window. I framed as much of the light beam as I could fit in the photo and clicked away. It truly captivated me for the brief few minutes of its presence.
Upon reflection, I found it so fitting that the light beams shone through that window in particular. The depiction in the stained glass is Jesus at the death of St. Joseph, the namesake of the Cathedral. Jesus is looking forward, mourning, but also looking on in hope, as death is not the end. The light that He is, the light of the world, shone through the light beams in St. Joseph Cathedral that day, showcasing that on World Mission Sunday, He is truly the light to the nations.
‘Through His Lens’ is a column in The Catholic Times documenting the personal experience of diocesan photographer and team member of the Diocese of Columbus Office of Communications, Sarah Lightle.