All Saints Day Outshines the War on Halloween

I am not angry about it, it is certainly not a disaster in most of our lives, but there is a war on Halloween. You may not have heard of it, but there is an effort by some to replace Halloween with Harvest Festivals or Fall Flings, or in the worst case scenarios, Judgment Houses. Halloween is considered by some to be evil, created by Satan or at best confusing or un-necessary. Contrary to these ideas, I believe Halloween is a part of what I call the “Sacred Three Days.” Yes, in the Christian Church, we commonly refer to Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter (or the Great Vigil of Easter) as the Sacred Three Days, and I agree that they are.

I also happen to believe that Halloween, All Saints Day and All Souls Day are a second “Sacred three Days.” Halloween began as a Celtic Festival presided over by Druid Priests in Northern Britain before Christianity come into the Island after 600 CE. In the dark, short days of Fall and Winter people’s thoughts turned to the fear of those things that can hurt or frighten them: wild beasts, lack of food, the apparent death of plants, and the potential death of livestock, that sustained their lives, and the worst fear of all, their own deaths. The Feast of Samhain gave them a chance to stare fear and death in the face and refuse to give in to them. To believe that darkness would be preceded by light, winter by spring and death by life. This gave them an opportunity to believe that life was stronger than death. “Samhain was seen as a liminal time, when the boundary between this world and the Otherworld could more easily be crossed. This meant the 'spirits’ could more easily come into our world.” I believe that this three day celebration in the church can also be a time that these spiritual boundaries can be easily crossed, as we connect with “those whom we love, but see no longer.”

When Christianity came into the British Isles after 600, the Christians as they are wont to do, adopted the feast of Samhain and Baptized it and it became “All Hallows Eve,” the eve of All Saints Day, the day they remembered the lives of those Saints who had become examples for Christians on how to live their lives, as well as the lives of ordinary people, those who are saints to their friends and family and nobody else. This was a time to celebrate the fact that life is stronger than death, that good is stronger than evil and that even when one is afraid, it is possible to stand up to those things of which we are afraid, including the greatest fear of all, the fear of death. Four centuries later the commemoration of those personal saints was moved to the following day, November 2.

As we twenty-first century Christians celebrate this powerful three days, we draw on Holy Scripture for inspiration and words to express those feelings for which we are, at times, speechless.

On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-matured wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-matured wines strained clear. And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death for ever.

Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken. It will be said on that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, so that he might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation. (Isaiah 25: 1-6a)

All Hallows Eve, “Halloween,” All Saints Day and All Souls Day give us an opportunity to participate in the things that are important to us: to dress up as creatures that are frightening or exciting or challenging, and to have fun doing it; to stare fear and death in the face and to proclaim that love is stronger than fear and that life is stronger than death.

The Church on All Saints and All Souls Days gives us a safe space to use all of our senses in remembering “those whom we love but see no more.” We burn incense and we pray for our departed loved ones; the good, the bad and the ugly. At Christ Church we light candles in their memories, perhaps shedding a few tears, smiling at found memories and often offering forgiveness, or asking forgiveness.

In our prayers and our sermons we remember honestly our lives together, when we loved and when we were shown love, when we were hurt and when we hurt others. As we gather together on these days we know those in our midst who have lost loved ones, not just from “natural causes,” but through tragedy: loved ones who died in tragic accidents, or horrible diseases much too young; who were murdered or committed suicide or died of drug overdoses.

All Saints and All Souls offer us an opportunity to offer up our grief and pain to God as we pray for continual healing. It also offers us an opportunity to remember again, that all of those who have Gone before us are gifts to us from God, and that we are gifts from God to them. I use the present tense, because we as Christians believe that for God’s people, life is changed not ended, and that the relationships we have we with each other can never end.

John the Divine reminds us in The New Testament book of Revelation that:

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘See, the home of God Is among   mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.’ And

the one who was seated on the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new.’           

The writer and Presbyterian Minister, Fredrick Buechner describes the importance of these three days and what it means to belong to the Holy People of God.

On all Saints’ Day, it is not just the saints of the church that we should remember in our prayers, but all the foolish ones and wise ones, the shy ones and overbearing ones, the broken ones and whole ones, the despots and tosspots and crackpots of our lives who one way or another, have been our particular fathers, mothers, (sisters and brothers), and saints.