For years we did not celebrate Halloween. Why? Were we kill joys? No, we were just taught in youth group as teens where Halloween originated from with the pagans and where trick or treat came from, jack-o-lanterns and all the other Halloween traditions. Seeing demons, witches and devils in all the drugstores leaned us away from being a part of this holiday for most of my children's lives. We would turn off the lights outside and watch a movie up in our bedroom or go out for the night to avoid the whole chabang. I even kept my kids home from school as all of the students dressed up at school and read books about witches and goblins on that day.
I will tell you now before you read any futher that we DO celebrate Halloween now and I will tell you what happened and why so hold tight.
You see, when I was raised in a basically atheist kind of home who went to church just out of tradition only on Easter morning once a year. But I also practiced witchcraft, went to card readings with my mom on Friday nights. Was trained in ESP, New Age, and even making people feel hot or cold, transferring energy, transcendental meditation etc. etc. I thought it was cool to have power over people. But, in the midst of this I was joining a group of people who were in a very very very dark place. If I look at the old pictures, I know it sounds crazy, but even our eyes were very dark. I ended up slowly spiraling downwards as my life was slowly destroyed piece by piece. A great darkness of which I will call the devil took over my life and left me with emptiness after the thrill of power was gone.
SO when I became a Christian it was like night and day for me. It is like I went from the deepest dark to a bright sunny day. I knew better than most people that witchcraft is not a game, it is not a hobby, it truly is worshiping the devil and the bible is true in that is says that the devil comes to steal, kill and destroy. My friends in witchcraft had done animal sacrifices on Halloween and thought of it as the most important day to worship the devil. Halloween then for me as a Christian was no more, I hope you can understand why from reading the aforementioned. I wasn't just a Christian saying "Halloween in the devils day" for me it actually was in a very real way.
Then, time passed. When we were youth pastors we would put on big costume parties for New Years instead of Halloween so we could all enjoy the fun of dressing up in costume for a party. Our church put on a Harvest Festival Ho Down as an alternative to Halloween where there was candy, games, dress up Western style and pony rides for the kids, all for free. This was great! We could have a wonderful family night that did not involve any demonic overtones from my past.
Eventually we moved here to Cranford 5 years ago and on Halloween when we stepped into our driveway to drive to the local Harvest Fest in our town, we saw what can only be described as a scene from E.T. You remember E.T. right? The scene where the streets are FILLED with kids in costume, running, playing, getting candy and having a ball. My children BEGGED us. Pleeesssssseeeee, can we just go next door and get some candy? They were in "non-scary" costumes already so Juan and I looked at each other with a frightened look. Should we? Could we after teaching kids for years the origins of Halloween? Pleeeeeeesssse, just one house they said. We sighed and said okay while biting our nails wondering if we were doing something wrong. They ran, laughed got candy came back with Milky Ways in hand. Pleeeessssseeee, just one more? Juan and I laughed at their cute little faces, one Indian Princess, one Candy Corn girl, one Flash Gordon and one 3 year old Superman. Juan and I thought, well, if you think about it, a Christmas Tree and Easter Egg hunt are Pagan traditions that we do as well don't we? We said yes and then we were off to the races, we could barely keep up with them as they dashed from house to house collecting candy and saying hi to their friends they passed in the streets who were equally adorable. Juan said, "I guess we are post-modern Christians now!" That made me feel better.
You see, each family event you do can somehow be linked to something bad or some bad people who do bad things. But your family does not have to have any part in that. Christmas is about Jesus being born in a manger, singing Christmas songs like "Silent Night" and going to church on Christmas Eve. But we also have a tree - not Christian, a few Santa ordainments - not Christian, and sing Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer. You see you can spin any event for bad or for good.
We now spin Halloween to be a day to dress up in fun non-scary, non-witchcraft, non-demonic but adorable costumes. We go see the neighbors who are thrilled to give out candy and admire the children's costumes and then come home to the the post-Halloween sorting of the candy ritual and bargaining with each other. "I will trade you 4 blow pops for that one Resses Peanut Butter cup". It is a fun night of glow sticks, apple cider, running in the dark, dressing up and being with family and friends. If there is anything dark about this holiday, we ignore that and embrace the good.
This year I will have a 15 year old Cruelella Deville?, Ms. Hannagian orphan keeper from Annie, a Darth Vador and a UPS man with stuffed puppies attached to his legs and arms. What fun! Can't wait to take lots of pictures.
Here is our newsletter link from last year with a picture of River as a Surfer Girl, Hailey as Your Mom, and Corban and Connor as The Mario Brothers (Their Fav. Wii game). I guess Christian's can like Halloween after all.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/25427573/1-10-New-Newsletter-Style-Letter-Size
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