Thursday, October 11, 2007

Halloween - It's that time of year again.

The following is my 'reply' to a misinformed 'post' on myspace.

You are a loving Christian lady and I respect that... but "Halloween" comes from the term "All Hallows Eve" or "All Saints Eve". The original celebration of All Saints Eve was in honor of all the Christians that have led exemplary lives and gone before us... you know, the "cloud of witnesses" [Heb. 12:1] that St. Paul speaks of.

Yet, it is true, that satan has taken it over [a Christian practice] and made it something evil. So, I agree that we can find other things to do at that time. For example, there is a Catholic tradition [small 't'], that suggests children and even adults dressing up as figures from the Bible and play acting that others can guess who they are supposed to be. This is quite fun as I have done the same myself.

Excerpt from This Rock online magazine
Can Catholics Celebrate Halloween?
Q: Some families in our parish don’t allow their children to celebrate Halloween. Should Catholics celebrate Halloween?
A: The word Halloween is a contraction for All Hallows Eve, which, before the reform of the liturgical calendar following the Second Vatican Council, was the vigil of All Saints and All Souls Days. As such, Halloween can be considered a Christian holiday. As with many Christian holidays, the secular world has attached its own traditions to the day (costumes, trick-or-treating, parties) that are not intrinsically wrong but can become problematic when the religious meaning of the holiday is set aside or forgotten.

For more information:
http://www.americancatholic.org/Features/Halloween/

Christianity has started many traditions that have been handed from one generation to the next. Secular society tries to take them and make them non-Christian, such as we can see with taking "Christ" out of Christmas. Should Christians give in to this approach?

I am sure you would agree that Christians need to, "test everything, holding to what is good", 1 Thess 5.

Christianity saw a pagan festival and decided to end the practice and replace it with something good and holy. That 'held' for centuries, until modern society decided to uproot the good tradition and make it bad... with satan smiling the whole time... as Christians oppose each other.

Christians should not oppose each other on this... just hold fast to what is good. Remember Christ's prayer for the 'unity of the believers' the night before He died. [Jn. 17:21]

I am sorry this is long, but just giving you a small amount of information didn't seem the right thing to do.

Your friend in Christ;
Philip