Remembering Halloween
Monday, October 27th, 2008
Remember Halloween? Remember when we were kids playing dress up, having Halloween parties at school, going trick-or-treating and getting lots and lots of candy? Remember how much fun that was? Boy, I sure do. But that was the good ol’ days. Those were the days before we learned that Halloween is really a satanic holiday closely connected with worshiping the devil and that children shouldn’t have anything to do with a celebration that glorifies Satan. And here we just thought it was about the candy. Man, am I sure glad we got that whole thing straightened out, aren’t you?
Michael Spencer laments over how the “great, fun, harmless, safe, nostalgic, exciting, slightly scary and completely un-demonic Halloweens of the past” are gone in the church culture of today. In an annual Halloween rant he recalls what Halloween celebrations were like as kids in the 60’s and 70’s when it was nothing more than “simple, old-fashioned, fun” and “innocent play in the name of an American custom.”
But that was before charlatan, Mike Warnke, and the evangelical media and the occult ministries began convincing people that celebrating Halloween was tantamount to Satanism. Sending little crumb crunchers out to go door-to-door begging for Hershey bars was scoring points for the other side. “A general fear of the occult, manifesting itself in Satanic ritual abuse mythology, crept into evangelicalism and took a deep hold on many churches,” says Spencer.
We’ve all heard the stories about Halloween originating in an ancient Celtic festival celebrated at the end of the harvest. It was believed that on October 31st the boundaries between the living and the dead were lifted so that the spirits of the dead would come back to life and walk among the living. Ooooooooo! Bonfires, jack-o-lanterns, costumes and masks all became part of a custom meant to ward off haunting spirits. Today the celebration lives on as a part of American culture, but let’s be honest here, folks. The pagan superstitions originally associated with the Celtic celebration have largely been forgotten. Other than a handful of occultists, NOBODY in America celebrates these pagan rituals and nobody EVER has. So please, can we stop with the rhetoric already?
Spencer offers these concerns:
It bothers me that we fall for such lame, ridiculous manipulators as the crowd that made all of those Halloweens past into satanic events.
It bothers me that any lie, exaggeration or fiction will find thousands of eager believers to pass it along.
It bothers me that the Biblical message about Satan would be co-opted by the fear-mongering and manipulation of the hucksters. (Read The Screwtape Letters for some real Satanism.)
It bothers me that such a wonderful part of my childhood and of American life has been turned into an example of evangelical paranoia and gullibility. We ruined something good, and everyone knows it but us.
I know all about the sophisticated responses thoughtful Christians have about Reformation day and All Saints Day. That’s fine, but it’s not the same. I just want my grandkids to be able to dress up in cute outfits and trick or treat without the local church designating them for exorcism.
Shame on those of us–evangelicals–who allowed Halloween to be taken away from families and many communities, all because we prefer to believe that life is a Frank Paretti novel.
Look, I’m not trying to be difficult. As I’ve said before, I don’t really have a dog in this race. My kids are teenagers and I live in somewhat of a rural neighborhood that doesn’t get many trick-or-treaters. Ultimately it’s never really been a hill for me to die on one way or the other. Still I have always tried to respect the convictions of others on this issue even though I don’t necessarily agree.
On the other hand I am convicted about the pious nose-in-the-air attitude that is often perceived of Christians by the nonbelieving community when it comes to cultural issues such as this. It just seems to me that there ought to be some area of middle ground here in which believers can engage the culture without compromising their convictions. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. It’s one thing to curse the darkness. It’s quite another to turn on the Light.
