Thoughts about Halloween as a Christian

In its classic pagan origins, Samhain is a day filled with meaning that finds its ultimate fulfillment in Christ.

At its simplest, Samhain was a celebration of community, a celebration that included members of the community both living and dead. I see in that a shadow of the communion we have in Christ, not just with believers around the world today, but with the entire church triumphant, which spans not only space but time as well. If Christ is the Resurrection and the Life, as he himself attests, our communion includes believers who have died over the two millenia since Christ, and those who awaited his coming.

Jack-o'-lanterns (originally carved in turnips or other similarly sized Old World vegetables) were meant as a ward against evil spirits. As I explained to Rachel today -- and as Evangeline chimed in, since she's familiar with my thinking -- Christ is the one who puts evil spirits to flight, once and for all. So when we carve a jack-o'-lantern, we do it as a statement of faith that Christ has defeated Satan, that Light has triumphed over darkness, and even though autumn is the dying season, we have no need to fear death.

The druids also wore costumes to lead evil spirits away from the towns and villages -- a commendable willingness to embrace self-sacrifice if needed -- by appearing in their costumes to be something other than what they were. And as my girls see it, the Halloween costume functions on two levels: one, it's a game of Let's Pretend, where they look like a witch, Spider-man, or Buzz Lightyear; but two, when we put on acts of righteousness, or we garb ourselves in Christ, God looks at us and sees only his son and his righteousness, not our sins.

Trick-or-treating? The Celts would leave offerings of food and drink out for the spirits of their departed loved ones, to make them feel welcome. Practically speaking, this was a way of ensuring that the needier members of the community would have food and drink in the coming weeks. I hope to perpetuate that attitude in later years by taking the girls to Elijah's Promise when Halloween isn't on a school night; in the meantime, I also remind that that the search for candy brings fleeting pleasure, but the search for Truth brings lasting joy.

Like any of our other holiday traditions, there is no meaning intrinsic in our Halloween customs beyond what we give them. I really don't understand why evangelicals prefer to live in fear that having fun trick-or-treating or carving faces in a pumpkin is going to set their children on the road to perdition.

At their simplest and most basic, these are harmless and essentially fun distractions when the weather starts getting cold; but when we take the same attitude toward them that Paul took toward actual idolatry on Mars Hill, we can find ourselves involved in the community surrounding us rather than deliberately isolated from it, and we can teach our children some valuable spiritual lessons that will serve them in good stead in situations that have nothing to do with a Superman costume.