Candles line road in Patchogue for families who have lost a child

Lining the walkway at Shorefront Park in Patchogue on Saturday evening were thousands of battery-operated tea light candles lit for families who have lost a child.

Every few feet, the light flickered from inside a jar featuring a name among the hundreds of children being remembered.

The Long Island families who have suffered the loss of a young son or daughter are bonded by tragedy and on one evening in December each year, they are connected through a trail of lights that runs two miles from the park up South Ocean Avenue to Main Street in Patchogue.

“It’s really beautiful because you'll see families frolicking through the field,” said organizer Christa Morris, who founded the event with a banquet in 2019 and took it outdoors during the COVID-19 pandemic a year later.

After seeing the field and streets lit that year, Morris, 40, of Patchogue knew it was how the tradition needed to continue and grow. About 1,500 people attend to pay respects.

“We had 8,000 candles the first time and we found that it was even more moving than the banquet,” said Morris, who has used private donations to grow the number of candles to 35,250 this year. The event is intentionally held during the holidays.

The owner of Don’t Toss the Bouquet in Patchogue, Morris launched her flower preservation business to help young couples remember their wedding day. But she soon began receiving requests for sad days too, as grieving parents looked for ways to hold on to the memories of their loss.

A mother of three boys, Morris launched an “Angel Baby” program, which has morphed into a nonprofit offering free preservation services for parents.

While she has not experienced a loss herself, through her work she has collected the names of about 400 children who were recognized this year.

One of the lit jars at the It Takes a Village Vigil in the park Saturday featured a name familiar to many attendees: Andrew McMorris of Wading River, who had his life cut short by a drunken driver while hiking with his Boy Scout troop along a roadway in Manorville.

On other jars were etched first names that felt familiar in how common they are among children today: Lily, Isabella, Ethan …

“Ethan was 2 and a couple of months when everything happened abruptly,” said Rosa Banegas, whose son Ethan Knezevich died in 2018 of congenital central hypoventilation syndrome, a rare respiratory disorder. “Ethan is, was, a happy boy.”

Banegas, who raised Ethan along with his brother and sister in Lindenhurst, traveled perhaps the farthest of anyone to attend this year’s vigil after moving to South Carolina. A friend bought airline tickets for Banegas and Ethan’s older sister, Amaris, to participate for the first time.

The bold and emotional display of lights was the work of about 100 volunteers, including Morris’ husband Rob, who could be seen replacing candles that stopped working during the five-hour event.

Kristi Rossy of Patchogue said she has returned to help out each year as she has gotten to know some of the moms and witnessed their emotional responses to the display.

“I would do anything I can to give them something that brings them joy,” the mother of two said as she finished decorating a tree with lights and began to head out to line the last of the candles along the surrounding streets. “It’s all about remembering their babies and saying their names.”

By Grant Parpan

grant.parpan@newsday.com@GrantParpan

Grant Parpan covers Suffolk County courts and federal courts for Newsday. A Long Island native, he joined Newsday in 2022.