Candy & Costumes & All Saints, Oh My!
Today is Halloween – a day that carries many mixed connotations and feelings. For many in the USA, it is a day of dressing up in silly costumes and for getting candy while trick-or-treating. For others, however, it is a day to glamorize the occult and place undue focus on the spiritual forces of wickedness. I imagine that if you sit firmly ensconced in one camp, you likely find it hard to believe anyone could be in the other. Personally, I’m not a big fan of Halloween. I have never liked scary things and I’m uncomfortable with haunted houses and things that go bump in the night. I am, however, a big fan of two prominent aspects of the day in the USA: costumes and candy! I probably don’t need to say much about candy – just look at my waist line – but costumes, well that’s definitely something about which I can wax poetic.
The costume hunt was an annual
rite of passage for me. I can remember going to Thrift Mart, a local
one-stop-shop near where I grew up, to select my costume of choice. You might
remember the plastic kind in the 70s and 80s that you wore like a smock and had
that unusually smelling mask with an elastic band going around your head. I
also remember when I outgrew those and my mom and dad took it upon themselves
to help me make my own. I had a homemade Ghostbuster costume made from a
jumpsuit and an old vacuum cleaner; a homemade King Arthur Tunic and Excalibur;
and the crown jewel of my homemade costume collection: a Darth Vader mask my
dad crafted out of an old plastic police helmet, cardboard, and copious amounts
of black spray paint. Yes, Halloween can be fun and a great opportunity to make
lasting memories. I am eager to escort Ethan through our neighborhood this
evening in his cool 80s dude getup from
what will likely be one of our final trick-or-treating jaunts of his childhood.
But once all the trick-or-treating and silly childhood costumes are in our
past, Halloween will still be something that will have significance in my life.
How about a brief history lesson
as to the origin of Halloween, also known as All Hallows' Eve? Though it definitely has some roots in pagan rituals,
many scholars believe it has roots in Christianity. Halloween is observed
on the eve of the Western Christian feast of All Saints Day. All Saints was
introduced on May 13th of the year 609. In 835, it was switched to
November 1 under Pope Gregory IV to coincide with the same date as a Celtic
observance called, Samhain, as a way to teach of GOD’s love, grace, and
preeminence.
In its earliest origins in
connection to Halloween, All Saints Day was the day it was believed the souls
of the departed made their transition from the physical world to the next. The
night before their transition, it was thought that the spirits would roam the
earth for one last hoorah. Some of the spirits were feared to be nasty, so
people would wear costumes to disguise themselves from those that might seek
revenge on the living. This gave rise to the tradition of wearing costumes on Halloween.
Today, the connection between
Halloween and All Saints is practically nonexistent, but in some Christian
traditions, All Saints is still celebrated as the day when we remember the
saints who have passed away and the spiritual bond between the living and those
who are in heaven. Traditions of All Saints Day include reading the names of
the deceased while ringing bells and/or lighting candles (we will do this in
each of our worship celebrations on Sunday at Cokes Chapel UMC). Taking
us back to Halloween, though, there are two other quite familiar modern traditions
that connect these two ancient days of observance.
In the 12th Century,
the custom of “souling” emerged where poor people and children in Great Britain
and Ireland would go door-to-door and offer songs and/or prayers in exchange for
cakes, fruit, and other food items. The custom of souling in costumes, also
known as guising, is believed to have its origins in Scotland in the late 1800s,
where costumed people carried hollowed out lanterns made from turnips. This
tradition continued in North America, but shifted to using pumpkins because of
their size and softness, making them easier to carve. They were more difficult
to carry, however, and as a result, began to serve as jack-o-lanterns and were
used as a way to ward off the nasty spirits that were gallivanting around on
Halloween. Trick-or-treating, as it is known today, is more of an Americanized
tradition from the original souling, allowing all children to enjoy the fun of
costumes and sweet treats, with the jack-o-lanterns informing kids and families
that a particular home is open to passing out candy.
I hope you find a little
Halloween history helpful in connecting our modern day fun traditions with the
All Saints celebrations we will experience in worship on Sunday. There is no
doubt that Halloween should mean more in light of the Christian connections to
our faith in salvation and life eternal as we add an exclamation point to the belief
that death is not the end. This means even more to me this year while I remember the loss of family and friends who are gathering with the great
cloud of witnesses (Hebrews 12.1) at the throne of Jesus in heaven! So as we
prepare for however we will mark this evening, may we do so remembering what Jesus said: “I am the resurrection and the life. The one
who believes in me will live, even though they die; and
whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11.25-26)
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