Every year around Halloween it has always been awkward for me. Growing up, nearly all of my friends would dress up and go trick or treating, but my family didn’t. We new better, because Halloween was an evil holiday, even if most people’s intentions were innocent enough. I was basically okay with this since our church had a “fall fest” which basically served the same purpose for kids–we got to dress up, and get a whole bunch of little candies. Good times. But is Halloween really evil? It kinda seemed so to me, with all the emphasis on ghosts, demons, and most of all just scaring people/being scared.
I hate being scared. I don’t understand why anyone would like it, I mean, Look it up. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/scare Being scared of anything but Almighty God’s judgement upon our sin is simply a waste of time, energy, and emotion–and even that fear should not lead to despair, but to humility, hope, and love. But again, is that what Halloween is really about?
What spurred me to write this post, besides the impending day, is this article I ran across the other day.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/2120849/posts
He makes a good point. After all, what is sin except the (partial) corruption of something good. The only thing I would like to comment on about the article is that while he notes that Easter time was also a holiday for the pagans, which finds is true fulfillment in Christ’s resurrection, it is also important to note that while that is true, Easter is first and foremost a true Historical event putting it far above the level of even Christmas.
I find the analogy between Mardi Gras and Halloween very helpful–and I can see some logic in it’s defense, but don’t think I’ll be frequenting any haunted houses.
Update: Called to Commuion, who writes some great stuff, by the way, has a good little article on Halloween.
