It's somehow fitting that nature provides the light for God's houses.

Inside a tiny hut, by the light of a solitary bulb, Bishop Varlaam melts blocks of the highest quality beeswax from Alberta's Peace River region.

The bishop presides over the candle factory, dedicated to the protection of Saint Vasili of Ostrog, at New Ostrog, the Canadian Orthodox Monastery of All Saints of North America.

The wax - processed without heat to preserve most of that distinctive honey fragrance - arrives by the ton several times a year.

Large blocks are placed in the candle factory, piled higher than Bishop Varlaam's waist and wider than he is tall.

He spends three to four days a week in the factory, melting beeswax, dipping wicks and forming candles destined for sanctuaries.

From just before Christmas and lasting until February - through most of the church's feast days - demand is higher and the bishop makes candles five or six days a week.

Although most of Bishop Varlaam's candles go to light the Orthodox churches in British Columbia, some go farther afield, as far north as Orthodox churches in a group of Alaskan islands in the Bering Sea.

An "assembly line" is set up by the bishop, who dips hundreds of candles.

Above, Bishop Varlaam dips the wicks into the wax to form the thin altar candles.