The Case for Mercy from Mercy Children's Clinic on Vimeo.
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One of the commentators I appreciate is Larry Kudlow. Larry is only a man and is often wrong when he begins prognosticating about what to "buy" or "sell", but philosophically he is a generally a "reasonable" voice.
This post is for my friends who struggle this time of year with whether or not to celebrate Halloween with their kids. It's a good read whatever your opinion. Watch for me and my kids Halloween night. Williams will be a little horse (2nd year in a row), Thomas an X-man, Sarah a ballerina, Caroline Hannah Montana, and me, I'll be holding the flashlight and eating way too much sugar!
OPEN BOOK, Views & Reviews, No. 28
Copyright (c) 1996 Biblical Horizons
August, 1996
It has become routine in October for some Christian schools to send out letters warning parents about the evils of Halloween, and it has become equally routine for me to be asked questions about this matter.
"Halloween" is simply a contraction for All Hallows’ Eve. The word "hallow" means "saint," in that "hallow" is just an alternative form of the word "holy" ("hallowed be Thy name"). All Saints’ Day is November 1. It is the celebration of the victory of the saints in union with Christ. The observance of various celebrations of All Saints arose in the late 300s, and these were united and fixed on November 1 in the late 700s. The origin of All Saints Day and of All Saints Eve in Mediterranean Christianity had nothing to do with Celtic Druidism or the Church’s fight against Druidism (assuming there ever even was any such thing as Druidism, which is actually a myth concocted in the 19th century by neo-pagans.)
In the First Covenant, the war between God’s people and God’s enemies was fought on the human level against Egyptians, Assyrians, etc. With the coming of the New Covenant, however, we are told that our primary battle is against principalities and powers, against fallen angels who bind the hearts and minds of men in ignorance and fear. We are assured that through faith, prayer, and obedience, the saints will be victorious in our battle against these demonic forces. The Spirit assures us: "The God of peace will crush Satan under your feet shortly" (Romans 16:20).
The Festival of All Saints reminds us that though Jesus has finished His work, we have not finished ours. He has struck the decisive blow, but we have the privilege of working in the mopping up operation. Thus, century by century the Christian faith has rolled back the demonic realm of ignorance, fear, and superstition. Though things look bad in the Western world today, this work continues to make progress in Asia and Africa and Latin America.
The Biblical day begins in the preceding evening, and thus in the Church calendar, the eve of a day is the actual beginning of the festive day. Christmas Eve is most familiar to us, but there is also the Vigil of Holy Saturday that precedes Easter Morn. Similarly, All Saints’ Eve precedes All Saints’ Day.
The concept, as dramatized in Christian custom, is quite simple: On October 31, the demonic realm tries one last time to achieve victory, but is banished by the joy of the Kingdom.
What is the means by which the demonic realm is vanquished? In a word: mockery. Satan’s great sin (and our great sin) is pride. Thus, to drive Satan from us we ridicule him. This is why the custom arose of portraying Satan in a ridiculous red suit with horns and a tail. Nobody thinks the devil really looks like this; the Bible teaches that he is the fallen Arch-Cherub. Rather, the idea is to ridicule him because he has lost the battle with Jesus and he no longer has power over us.
(The tradition of mocking Satan and defeating him through joy and laughter plays a large role in Ray Bradbury’s classic novel, Something Wicked This Way Comes, which is a Halloween novel.)
The gargoyles that were placed on the churches of old had the same meaning. They symbolized the Church ridiculing the enemy. They stick out their tongues and make faces at those who would assault the Church. Gargoyles are not demonic; they are believers ridiculing the defeated demonic army.
Thus, the defeat of evil and of demonic powers is associated with Halloween. For this reason, Martin Luther posted his 95 challenges to the wicked practices of the Church to the bulletin board on the door of the Wittenberg chapel on Halloween. He picked his day with care, and ever since Halloween has also been Reformation Day.
Similarly, on All Hallows’ Eve (Hallow-Even – Hallow-E’en – Halloween), the custom arose of mocking the demonic realm by dressing children in costumes. Because the power of Satan has been broken once and for all, our children can mock him by dressing up like ghosts, goblins, and witches. The fact that we can dress our children this way shows our supreme confidence in the utter defeat of Satan by Jesus Christ – we have NO FEAR!
I don’t have the resources to check the historical origins of all Halloween customs, and doubtless they have varied from time to time and from Christian land to Christian land. "Trick or treat" doubtless originated simply enough: something fun for kids to do. Like anything else, this custom can be perverted, and there have been times when "tricking" involved really mean actions by teenagers and was banned from some localities.
We can hardly object, however, to children collecting candy from friends and neighbors. This might not mean much to us today, because we are so prosperous that we have candy whenever we want, but in earlier generations people were not so well o_, and obtaining some candy or other treats was something special. There is no reason to pour cold water on an innocent custom like this.
Similarly, the jack-o’-lantern’s origins are unknown. Hollowing out a gourd or some other vegetable, carving a face, and putting a lamp inside of it is something that no doubt has occurred quite independently to tens of thousands of ordinary people in hundreds of cultures worldwide over the centuries. Since people lit their homes with candles, decorating the candles and the candle-holders was a routine part of life designed to make the home pretty or interesting. Potatoes, turnips, beets, and any number of other items were used.
Wynn Parks writes of an incident he observed: "An English friend had managed to remove the skin of a tangerine in two intact halves. After carving eyes and nose in one hemisphere and a mouth in the other, he poured cooking oil over the pith sticking up in the lower half and lit the readymade wick. With its upper half on, the tangerine skin formed a miniature jack-o’-lantern. But my friend seemed puzzled that I should call it by that name. `What would I call it? Why a "tangerine head," I suppose.’" (Parks, "The Head of the Dead," The World & I, November 1994, p. 270.)
In the New World, people soon learned that pumpkins were admirably suited for this purpose. The jack-o’-lantern is nothing but a decoration; and the leftover pumpkin can be scraped again, roasted, and turned into pies and muffins.
In some cultures, what we call a jack-o’-lantern represented the face of a dead person, whose soul continued to have a presence in the fruit or vegetable used. But this has no particular relevance to Halloween customs. Did your mother tell you, while she carved the pumpkin, that this represented the head of a dead person and with his soul trapped inside? Of course not. Symbols and decorations, like words, mean different things in different cultures, in different languages, and in different periods of history. The only relevant question is what does it mean now, and nowadays it is only a decoration.
And even if some earlier generations did associate the jack-o’-lantern with a soul in a head, so what? They did not take it seriously. It was just part of the joking mockery of heathendom by Christian people.
This is a good place to note that many articles in books, magazines, and encyclopedias are written by secular humanists or even the pop-pagans of the so-called "New Age" movement. (An example is the article by Wynn Parks cited above.) These people actively suppress the Christian associations of historic customs, and try to magnify the pagan associations. They do this to try and make paganism acceptable and to downplay Christianity. Thus, Halloween, Christmas, Easter, etc., are said to have pagan origins. Not true.
Oddly, some fundamentalists have been influenced by these slanted views of history. These fundamentalists do not accept the humanist and pagan rewriting of Western history, American history, and science, but sometimes they do accept the humanist and pagan rewriting of the origins of Halloween and Christmas, the Christmas tree, etc. We can hope that in time these brethren will reexamine these matters as well. We ought not to let the pagans do our thinking for us.
Nowadays, children often dress up as superheroes, and the original Christian meaning of Halloween has been absorbed into popular culture. Also, with the present fad of "designer paganism" in the so-called New Age movement, some Christians are uneasy with dressing their children as spooks. So be it. But we should not forget that originally Halloween was a Christian custom, and there is no solid reason why Christians cannot enjoy it as such even today.
"He who sits in the heavens laughs; Yahweh ridicules them" says Psalm 2. Let us join in His holy laughter, and mock the enemies of Christ on October 31.
Sometimes when this happens, that formerly big tough guy gets emotional. Such was the case this morning after finishing my viewing of the new, sure-to-be controversial documentary, Lord, Save Us From Your Followers. I was so moved by knowing that I am on the right journey, and have come to some of the right conclusions, that I found myself weeping. It wasn’t so much for me; I would say it was for the hurt I feel for a Church which has forgotten about the mission of Jesus, and especially about those who have been hurt. There were also tears for those who get it and are being Jesus to a hurting world.
This film by Dan Merchant should be required viewing and discussion for any church. The good thing is that some churches will take up this task; the sad thing is, most churches will ignore the challenge. It is a shame; it is why the Church (as perceived by many) has become more like the whore of Hosea than a beautiful bride that loves her husband, Jesus Christ.
Lord, Save Us is a documentary that explores the Church, specifically in America. In the exploration we see not only the perception of the Church from various segments of society, but also how many within the Church view themselves. It is a road trip of sorts where discussion takes place not only on the streets of various cities, but with certain public individuals. From Al Franken to Ann Coulter, and from Bono of U2 to Anthony Campolo, numerous views are presented and challenged. The movie, while quoting and using the Bible at various points, depends largely on common sense.
The central thrust is looking at how the Church and Christianity would be viewed if they did one simple thing, act like Jesus. The effects, the challenges that come about are not only eye opening; they are concepts that are effective. We see the effectiveness of this approach in various places it seems the Church has been at war with, from the media to the gay community and from the public sector to the homeless and poor. We see this by practical applications of trial and error by the makers of the film, and we see it from the reality of the impact of parachurch organizations like World Vision in their work with the poor in Ethiopia.
One of the amazing points in showing the power of being like Jesus comes not through the mouths of the religious, but those who are outside of the institutional Church, or mainstream Christianity. It is here that, if those individual people who make up the Church choose to listen and learn, a great deal of effective work can be done. Now don’t get me wrong; one of the reasons I loved this movie is that it doesn’t ask us to do these things to make projects out of people: we do it because we love them, just as Jesus loved them.
One of the things I think some within Christianity and the Church will become critical of is that the movie doesn’t address the “salvation” concepts required by some within Christian circles. On this point I would simply state, I don’t believe that is the purpose of the film. In the Bible, Jesus tells the story about one who is planting or sowing seeds. Some fall on good ground, some bad ground; there are some that come and help some along to grow and be effective; and some… well, some seeds die. It all starts with sowing seeds, a concept that I believe the Church, and many with Christianity have forgotten about.
I love this movie, though, because it addresses the idea that the building of relationships, the showing of unconditional love, of universal acceptance of the person, compassion for their hurts, is a starting point of showing a person the very love that Jesus showed them. It is in taking on the characteristics of Jesus that we genuinely learn to love others to the point that this love ultimately becomes a natural part of our persona. Jesus loved all people; so should we, including the child dying of AIDS, the hurting in a hurricane-devastated city, the homeless on the street, even those we may disagree with: the Democrat, the Republican, the Homosexual, and the Ultra Conservative. Love is patient, love is kind, love is… well, love is many things, but it is seldom confrontational, angry, hateful, and disrespecting.
Those of us who call ourselves followers of Jesus, or Christian, often think we have all of the answers; yet we don’t understand those we are communicating with. In theological terms, getting to know people, showing people you love them where they are at, is a concept we know Jesus illustrated; it is a concept called incarnation. Followers of Jesus understand what it means to love even those they may hate; so what does this say about our ability to love those we simply disagree with on various points? While there is certainly the need for talking about the specifics of what Jesus said, that discussion has to start with respect and understanding.
Unfortunately, many who call themselves Christian represent in name all of us who say we follow Jesus. The consequences of that has been devastating; and in many ways, it is likely those individuals who are so dogmatic in their need to “confront sin” have damaged the possibility of some people rejecting Jesus based solely on the behaviors and actions of those most outspoken in the name of Jesus. When religious leaders call for the assassination of political leaders, or political leaders say we should kill all of the godless in a nation and make that nation a Christian nation, is it any wonder people are confused?
When Jesus says to love your enemy, to pray for those that would do you harm, where do His followers get off saying and doing the exact opposite? When we do, is it any wonder people are confused? When taking these questions, our methods, and our results seriously, is it any wonder that real followers of Jesus would say about many in Christianity, Lord, Save Us From Your Followers?
