halloween

[dkhamner]

if this has been beat to death also i'm sorry, i'm pretty new to this section of the web site. i never scrolled down this far to see this Topic "Hunting and Religion". I love it, what a great idea this is!

ok, the topic of halloween. the church that I attend and most of the churches that i've attended in my life have usually done somethingfor the children on halloween. such things like a carnival, party, movies....the list goes on and on. the church isn't doing this to celebrate halloween but to get children from celebrating halloween from its original meaning. i do disagree with this. i have two children (7 and 10) and we do nothing on halloween. our pastor is wanting to do something this year and i told my wife that we would not be attending. i feel that even if a church is doing something on halloween they are still celebrating that day. why should a church do anything? in my opinion and it is my opinion, its a day like most others, we should treat it as such and not bring attention to it. i hope that you can understand what i'm trying to say.

[motor]

Imho you are right..it is a pagan holiday and the church should not celebrate it in anyway.

[Leafrivermac]

We never really observed halloween either. Some years the youth of our church had an anti halloween get together. Basically a cook out, volley ball, etc. What did you guys do about trick or treaters tho? I personally think that rather than turning the kids away empty handed, that it's a good time to hand out little bible tracts, and I admit that I gave them candy also.

[MOTOWNHONKEY]

I think the kids are just out to get some free candy and I oblidge them.

[Rebel Hog]

I also believe it's a pagan celebration and the kids won't
come to my place, cause it's 1200 ft from the road in the
dark.

[m.t.hands]

cause it's 1200 ft from the road in the
dark.

same here were about half that distance and 1 of only 6 houses in 2 miles we don't see many. i still have mixed feelings about the observance/participation of halloween, whats the history, been a lot of years since i studied any of this, islightly remember some but have forgotten most of the "purpose?" of halloween

[Rebel Hog]

Most Satanists celebrate this as their high holy day and even offer human sacrifices to the devil. Until recently, most Christians have not questioned this traditional celebration, but rather have gone along with it by even bringing Halloween parties into the church. The earliest Halloween celebrations were not held by the early church, but the Druids in honor of Samhain, the "lord of the dead", and his demons, whose festival fell on November 1. Halloween actually means "holy or hallowed evening."



Ephesians 5:6-12: "Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience. 7 Be not ye therefore partakers with them. 8 For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light: 9 (For the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth10 Proving what is acceptable unto the Lord. 11 And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. 12 For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret."

[m.t.hands]

thanks Reb, been a few days since the last time i had studied anything about halloween, what about kids trick or treating, what is the signifigance/tradition, is that just part of the celebration? when did that part start or has it always been there just not partaken of by Christians until recently, what time frame, i'm trying to do some other searches on this also, i can see the evil side of this, but i also remeber as a kid it was always about the candy, i never knew any of those things (the evil part) as a kid,unfortunately the same as some use Christmas simply for a time ofgift giving, with no thought of the signifagance of the day[&o]

interesting post and i'll be doing some other searches, keith

[Tazman]

Well I did a little research on Halloween, here is some of what I have found:

The word itself, "Halloween," actually has its origins in the Catholic Church. It comes from a contracted corruption of All Hallows Eve. November 1, "All Hollows Day" (or "All Saints Day"), is a Catholic day of observance in honor of saints. But, in the 5th century BC, in Celtic Ireland, summer officially ended on October 31. The holiday was called Samhain (sow-en), the Celtic New year.

The Celtic celebration of Samhain (Not Halloween)

One story says that, on that day, the disembodied spirits of all those who had died throughout the preceding year would come back in search of living bodies to possess for the next year. It was believed to be their only hope for the afterlife. The Celts believed all laws of space and time were suspended during this time, allowing the spirit world to intermingle with the living.
Naturally, the still-living did not want to be possessed. So on the night of October 31, villagers would extinguish the fires in their homes, to make them cold and undesirable. They would then dress up in all manner of ghoulish costumes and noisily paraded around the neighborhood, being as destructive as possible in order to frighten away spirits looking for bodies to possess.
Probably a better explanation of why the Celts extinguished their fires was not to discourage spirit possession, but so that all the Celtic tribes could relight their fires from a common source, the Druidic fire that was kept burning in the Middle of Ireland, at Usinach.

The Romans adopted Samhain (Not Halloween)

The Romans adopted the Celtic practices as their own. But in the first century AD, Samhain was assimilated into celebrations of some of the other Roman traditions that took place in October, such as their day to honor Pomona, the Roman goddess of fruit and trees. The symbol of Pomona is the apple, which might explain the origin of our modern tradition of bobbing for apples on Halloween.
The thrust of the practices also changed over time to become more ritualized. As belief in spirit possession waned, the practice of dressing up like hobgoblins, ghosts, and witches took on a more ceremonial role.

The Irish brought the custom of Halloween (not Samhain) to the US.

The custom of Halloween was brought to America in the 1840's by Irish immigrants fleeing their country's potato famine. At that time, the favorite pranks in New England included tipping over outhouses and unhinging fence gates.

The custom of trick or treating had Christian origins!

The custom of trick-or-treating is thought to have originated not with the Irish Celts, but with a ninth-century European custom called souling. On November 2, All Souls Day, early Christians would walk from village to village begging for "soul cakes," made out of square pieces of bread with currants. The more soul cakes the beggars would receive, the more prayers they would promise to say on behalf of the dead relatives of the donors. At the time, it was believed that the dead remained in limbo for a time after death, and that prayer, even by strangers, could expedite a soul's passage to heaven.

The Jack-O-Lanterns story has Christian roots, not Pagan.

The Jack-o-lantern custom probably comes from Irish folklore. As the tale is told, a man named Jack, who was notorious as a drunkard and trickster, tricked Satan into climbing a tree. Jack then carved an image of a cross in the tree's trunk, trapping the devil up the tree. Jack made a deal with the devil that, if he would never tempt him again, he would promise to let him down the tree.
According to the folk tale, after Jack died, he was denied entrance to Heaven because of his evil ways, but he was also denied access to Hell because he had tricked the devil. Instead, the devil gave him a single ember to light his way through the frigid darkness. The ember was placed inside a hollowed-out turnip to keep it glowing longer.
The Irish used turnips as their "Jack's lanterns" originally. But when the immigrants came to America, they found that pumpkins were far more plentiful than turnips. So the Jack-O-Lantern in America was a hollowed-out pumpkin, lit with an ember.

A basic summation of the history of Halloween.

So, although some cults may have adopted Halloween as their favorite "holiday," the day itself did not grow out of evil practices. It grew out of the rituals of Celts celebrating a new year, and out of Medieval prayer rituals of Europeans. And today, even many churches have Halloween parties or pumpkin carving events for the kids. After all, the day itself is only as evil as one cares to make it.

The last line above is the way I look at Halloween overall, and the above in total proves that Halloween is a Christian custom whose day was basically changed to coincide with the Celtic End of Summer aka Celtic New Year. In reading the above one can see that the vast majority of the way Halloween is observed here in the US has all Christian roots with the exception of the original day it was observed.

After all, the day itself is only as evil as one cares to make it.

[jackalope]

Good read Tazman. I've looked it up before and havefound the same informationthat you pointed out. My wife and I help the church with thier "Fall Festival"which is what they celebrate instead of Halloween.