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 Posted: Sat Oct 27, 2007 1:30 pm
My father will tell me that I shouldn't celebrate Halloween as it is an evil holiday.
I think it's a secular holiday now so why can't we celebrate it
DISCUSS;
HALLOWEEN
All Hallows Eve
Catholic Perspective (or Christian)
and Issues of Halloween
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Posted: Sun Oct 28, 2007 1:02 am
Halloween
Halloween isn't really a celebration where we wear scary costumes and put death-related decorations everywhere and go trick-or-treating. What it originally and officially is is All Souls Day and All Saint's Day.
All Souls Day
All Soul's Day is the day designated by the Church when be hold in special attention those who have departed from us (died) and offer mass and prayers for them. Although we can always pray for them anytime (and we do so especially in mass), this day is a special day.
Why do we pray for the dead?
The Church is united under Christ who is it's founder (The One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church). This means that we are one in faith and are connected by the same faith whether we are in heaven, here on earth or suffering in purgatory. Like one big family in Christ, we pray for the departed so that their suffering in purgatory would be lessened or shortened. We assume that they are in purgatory and if the are not or no longer are, that's fine.
All Saints Day
This is the special day designated by the Church where we commemorate those who have lived holy lives and have helped and inspired us to live holy lives as well. All Christians are called be saints; people who live in the same way that Christ lived and to offer ourselves to God for God's sake and not our own.
Do we worship Saints?
NO. Any reverence towards saints is directed towards God since God is the source of their holiness and the author of the faith they hold. To remember them is to remember God's love and goodness.
What's with the costumes?
Since Halloween is praying for and remembering the departed, some people may relate it to death and thus celebrate it with costumes and objects related to the concept of death. This way of celebrating became popular because many people find trick-or-treating and costume parties more worthwhile than praying. Also, many people do not even know the meaning of the occasion usually because these people aren't Catholics.
These things happen often to Christian holidays. It's like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny which are just "additions" that tend to obscure the original Christian holidays of Christmas and Easter. And though, these additions are not necessarily evil, and their source may just be innocent ignorance, as Christians we must never forget the true meaning of holidays: Christ and story of our salvation.
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Posted: Sun Oct 28, 2007 2:59 am
*points at Jarvis*
You killed the discussion!
Anyways, it shouldn't really be celebrated, seeing as there is nothing to celebrate. Halloween itself is not a real holiday, its just an excuse for children to have candy :p
If you have kids dressing up, just make sure they don't dress up as the devil, or witches, or anything of that sort. The holiday is evil only if one makes it so, although... I don't see any good that comes from going to door to door for candy. I wouldn't really let my sister go, but that's more because I do not want her to get too much candy.
Like Jarvis said, it has origins in Christian terms, but it slowly evolved to fit the ever-changing lifestyles of the American public, which is turning to secular and even more materialistic.
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Posted: Sun Oct 28, 2007 5:31 am
Damien_deuce *points at Jarvis* You killed the discussion! Anyways, it shouldn't really be celebrated, seeing as there is nothing to celebrate. Halloween itself is not a real holiday, its just an excuse for children to have candy :p If you have kids dressing up, just make sure they don't dress up as the devil, or witches, or anything of that sort. The holiday is evil only if one makes it so, although... I don't see any good that comes from going to door to door for candy. I wouldn't really let my sister go, but that's more because I do not want her to get too much candy. Like Jarvis said, it has origins in Christian terms, but it slowly evolved to fit the ever-changing lifestyles of the American public, which is turning to secular and even more materialistic. Sorry. I couldn't help it. sweatdrop I just get carried away. sweatdrop I think it should be celebrated but in a way that it is meant to be. Trick-or-treating and costume parties are not necessarily wrong and it would be alright to do those things as long as you do not neglect the true object of the celebration and avoid things contrary to religion.
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Posted: Wed Oct 31, 2007 11:28 pm
Naw, I meant the whole mentality about going up to doors and asking for candy kind of imposes negative value system on the children.
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Posted: Thu Nov 01, 2007 1:37 pm
Uhm, no. It is /not/ ALl Souls and Saints day.
All Souls day was placed ontop of All Hallows Eve, a pegan holiday of worship. The main one, in fact. When the Catholic Church tried to convert everyone to Catholicism, they figured the Pegans would be easier to convert if they placed one of /their/ major 'holidays' on top of one of the most important Pegan ritual days.
Then follow it up by a day for all the Saints who don't have desisnated days. So their rituals would rule out the Pegan's.
Yep.
That's the origins.
Hollowe'en is based of All Hallows Eve, a Pegan holiday. ^^
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Posted: Thu Nov 01, 2007 4:42 pm
All hollows eve is A GOOD THING
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Posted: Thu Nov 01, 2007 10:15 pm
sephiroth030 All hollows eve is A GOOD THING If you're a Pegan. xD All Souls Day is a good thing. Getting free candy from strangers is a good thing. Not All Hallows Eve.
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Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 7:15 pm
[Lacrimosa] sephiroth030 All hollows eve is A GOOD THING If you're a Pegan. xD All Souls Day is a good thing. Getting free candy from strangers is a good thing. Not All Hallows Eve. smart a**
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Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 8:34 pm
sephiroth030 [Lacrimosa] sephiroth030 All hollows eve is A GOOD THING If you're a Pegan. xD All Souls Day is a good thing. Getting free candy from strangers is a good thing. Not All Hallows Eve. smart a** Beg your pardon? There is absolutly no reason to be rude to me.
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Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 9:42 pm
[Lacrimosa] sephiroth030 [Lacrimosa] sephiroth030 All hollows eve is A GOOD THING If you're a Pegan. xD All Souls Day is a good thing. Getting free candy from strangers is a good thing. Not All Hallows Eve. smart a** Beg your pardon? There is absolutly no reason to be rude to me. I agree, that was unneeded... Anyway, from what I have been told, All Hallows Eve was a day in which the spirits would come back(as has been established), and people would disguise themselves so the spirits would not recognize them. Probly directed towards the bad spirits, or those who had a vendetta against certain others among the living. I don't completely remember, but something like that...it explains the costumes, at least. All those holidays are also connected to Dia de Los Muertos-The Day of the Dead. Basically the Hispanic equivalent of Hallows Eve, I suppose...except they celebrate the dead...and they still celebrate it today.
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Posted: Sat Nov 03, 2007 2:14 am
I really like this forum; most of the time, it is so informative wink
OOT: Jarvis, that's one heck of a cool avatar. Mind telling me what goes onto your avatar?
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Posted: Sat Nov 03, 2007 11:11 am
Halloween actually has its origins in Samhain, a Celtic pagan holiday. This article here explains this in light of Celtic Tradition.
First off, at the end of October, it was believed the veil between the dead and the living was at its weakest. The Samhain is a celebration, in which the harvesting of the crops was heavily involved; however at night, bonfires were lit, dances and prayers acted out, and often costumes worn in order to appease the dead and keep them from harming the crops. Many a time the costumes were worn to trick "bad spirits" and to pretend to be "good spirits."
When the Romans came, their celebrations for the dead, known as Feralia, intermingled with the Celtics. The Romans also incorporated the celebration of Pomona, the Goddess of fruit, into the celebration. Pomona's symbol was an apple, and this is where the tradition of apple-bobbing has its roots.
At this point in history, the celebration was not known as Halloween. This name actually derives from the Christian name of the holiday: All Hallow's Eve. When All Saints Day was moved to November 1st by Popes Gregory III and Gregory IV, the night before became a Holy Night, which was named All Hallow's Eve. Over the centuries this was then shortened to "Halloween."
In the ninth century, the new day began at sunset in accordance with the "Florentine Calender" that was heavily used at the time. Because of this custom, All Hallow's Eve and All Saints Day was actually on the same day and celebrated as one day. Over time however, the two separated as the marking of a new day altered from sunset to sunrise. The Catholic Church then celebrated October 31st as the Vigil to All Saints Day, although the vigil still retained the name of All Hallow's Eve. The Vigil honored the dead, while All Saints Day honored the saints and those still living. These two Holy Days are still celebrated today, and the traditions of apple-bobbing from the Romans and the costumes from the Celtics still exist on All Hallow's Eve (Halloween). Some experts associate the current use of costumes as a night to pretend to be something else, as more of a time of fun and games and not really associated with any sort of spiritual significance. There is also the theory that current use of apple-bobbing on Halloween is seen as a celebration of life on a night for the dead.
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Posted: Sun Nov 04, 2007 6:42 am
ok, so I have a question on top of the question..all the protestant megachurches around my house all have harvest fests in place of celebrating halloween. to me, this seems even more pagan than just celebrating halloween itself...they use the same name as pagans did when they were worshiping things like the moon and stuff, so why isn't that construed as pagan?
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Posted: Sun Nov 04, 2007 1:54 pm
xomo ok, so I have a question on top of the question..all the protestant megachurches around my house all have harvest fests in place of celebrating halloween. to me, this seems even more pagan than just celebrating halloween itself...they use the same name as pagans did when they were worshiping things like the moon and stuff, so why isn't that construed as pagan? They didn't have 'harvest feasts', they had rituals and stuff to help their harvest be fruitful whilist they worshiped the harvest. Pegans have elemental base stuff. The worshiped they earth for giving them the things they needed. A 'Harvest Feast' at ANY Church is a family and GOD bases activity where you thank God for His wonderful grace and mercy for giving you enough food to eat and so forth. They are not worshipping the earth for giving them the food. It is not Pegan. I don't see what's so wrong with Protestants and what they do. I went to a CATHOLIC Church that did that kind og thing. In fact, they had a Harvest Festivel to raise money for the feast and other nessicitys the Church needed, such as clean up and maintaining the place, for it was very large. ^^ So it's not just a Protestant thingy.
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