Today is Halloween, and it is a “celebration” that we did not have when I was a kid in the 1950s. It suddenly seemed to spring up like toads on the lawn, as evil does, and now the neighbourhood is full of cobwebs, withes and warlocks, tricking or treating. Get away from my house, Satan, I scream!
What we are seeing today is a modernist degradation of All Hallow’s Eve, the holiday before All Saints’ Day the day before the Western Christian feast of All Saints and initiates the season of All Hallowtide, which lasts three days and concludes with All Souls’ Day. But, there is also a pagan take on this as well:
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Halloween
“Halloween had its origins in the festival of Samhain among the Celts of ancient Britain and Ireland. On the day corresponding to November 1 on contemporary calendars, the new year was believed to begin. That date was considered the beginning of the winter period, the date on which the herds were returned from pasture and land tenures were renewed. During the Samhain festival the souls of those who had died were believed to return to visit their homes, and those who had died during the year were believed to journey to the otherworld. People set bonfires on hilltops for relighting their hearth fires for the winter and to frighten away evil spirits, and they sometimes wore masks and other disguises to avoid being recognized by the ghosts thought to be present. It was in those ways that beings such as witches, hobgoblins, fairies, and demons came to be associated with the day. The period was also thought to be favourable for divination on matters such as marriage, health, and death. When the Romans conquered the Celts in the 1st century CE, they added their own festivals of Feralia, commemorating the passing of the dead, and of Pomona, the goddess of the harvest.”
The modernists have forgotten the Christian take, and have gone down the line of demons, witches and wizards. Of course, Hollywood has popularised Halloween as a time for psycho killers, which at a theological level is correct.
Now we even have our government warning about a Halloween movie that is leading to people collapsing and/or vomiting in cinemas because of its violence:
I just read the headline, and even then, had to spend a considerable time in prayer to my Lord to clean myself from the contamination of secular degeneration, sin and demonology. Christians have seemingly accepted all of this, putting up little resistance.
As a Biblical Christian I turn as always to the Great Book, not just the Good book. Paul observed: “You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord’s table and the table of demons”: 1 Corinthians 10:21.