Halloween

However controversial, we are going to be ‘celebrating’ Halloween this year, again. Matt grew up with fond and warm memories of Halloween—running around safe neighborhoods, receiving safe candy, not dealing with the theological implications of celebrating Halloween and ignoring All Saints. I, for understandable reasons, never celebrated Halloween or All Saints Day—the one because it was too close to the occult for a Baptist Boarding School and the other because it was too Catholic. Both days always passed carefully unmarked. Although, my senior year, in June, a group of us put on interesting hats and glasses and hit all the Staff Houses up for candy and money. Strangely, we did not get in trouble for this defiance, but we didn’t get much candy either because no one expected us.

So, in the tradition of Matt, for the last five years our kiddos started out their first Halloween as a Chili Pepper, moving from there to a Bee (at age one or two) and from thence on to something of their choice. Last year A was a sort of construction working person and E was a princess. This year A will either be Spiderman or a Knight in Shining Armor (he still can’t decide) and E will be a ballerina. We look forward to R’s stepping into our third time round of an Angry Angry Bee.

And last night we carved a pumpkin in classical mode.

As Matt wielded skillfully his knife and spoon, E drew on her small pumpkin and said, sing songingly, ‘People who celebrate Halloween worship Satan. That’s us.’
Matt and I and Nonni all began quietly freaking out.
‘Where did you hear that, E?’ Matt asked.
‘In school. From my friends.’
‘All your friends?’ I asked.
‘No, just J—‘ said E.
We all launched into a discussion of how its really about All Saints’ Day and how we are Not worshiping Satan, and how that would be Very Bad. E seemed unmoved and concentrated on her pumpkin.

I’m not completely surprised by this. We’ve chosen a school for her that we were pretty sure would Not be having Halloween Parties. I have no idea what E is telling the other children. It’s probably a jumble, all of them half understanding what we, their parents, believe. And, while I wish other Christian parents wouldn’t make blanket catastrophic statements like ‘all people who celebrate Halloween worship Satan’ I can understand where they’re coming from. It is an increasingly difficult ‘holiday’ to deal with—another occasion the culture at large has embraced the dark night of shadow and rejected the clear lighted day of rejoicing. It’s been particularly interesting to consider this cultural drive given that Matt in his Sunday morning Adult Ed has been covering Contemporary Neo-Paganism, particularly Wicca. More and more of us ordinary Christians are running into this developing religious/cultural affiliation, especially those near college campuses. On our evening walks with the dog, we pass a house that appears to have a sort of celtic/pagan shrine or offering for or on the occasion of (?) Samhain.

So that’s why I have ‘celebrate’ in scare quotes. Because I approach it with caution, delighted for my children to step into the clothes and shoes of other kinds of people for the evening, and for them to run around this safe practically old fashioned neighborhood, in the way that Matt remembers so fondly, eliciting candy of all things, from the neighbors, but cautious of the darkness. I look forward to the light and joy of the next day, of spending time considering those saints who have clarified and illuminated the Narrow Way for me personally.