Church Says Halloween OK, Party May Begin

Click here for a comprehensive list of Halloween activities Halloween 2013 night

When I was younger, churches likened celebrating Halloween to attending the devil’s birthday party. Dressing a child in a witches’ cloak and inviting strangers to either trick or treat them were the devil’s devices, and the ghouls, ghosts, zombies and monsters were evil enough to not need further comment. We all know we won’t find those in Heaven.

Whether I had legitimately salted the wounds of Jesus or the notion was the result of a well-indoctrinated scare tactic propagated by area preachers, there was still a sense of guilt as I sat washing away the stains of sin in form of drawn-on freckles in my Pebbles costume.

Luckily, local pastors say kids nowadays don’t have to worry too much about being turned back at the pearly gates on Judgment Day because they dressed as Harry Potter one late fall night and greedily scarfed down Skittles and Snickers.

“The first thing to remember is that the Bible says that every day is made by God,” says Angelo Bible Church Associate Pastor Kyle Hooks. “There’s a minority of Christians out there that like to hate on Halloween because it’s this Pagan holiday, where we’re worshipping the devil and anything like that…but everyday is made by God, life goes on because he sustains it.”

Hooks, like many local pastors and church congregations, will be taking part in a Halloween celebration, but that doesn’t mean he’s turning his back on the church for a night of raucous hedonism. Rather, the objective is to use the opportunity to spread the word.

“We don’t believe in celebrating Halloween for what it is, but we believe in giving people an alternative,” explains High School Pastor Brian Hutschinson of PaulAnn Baptist Church. “They can dress up, they can do all that, nothing scary. Personally, my kids don’t celebrate Halloween,” he said.

Hutschinson and Hooks both make a distinction between celebrating the holiday for fun and celebrating for religious reasons.

Hooks says: “Halloween actually comes from a Christian history. It’s certain days in the Roman Catholic Church were given to individual canonized saints, like Valentine’s Day to honor Saint Valentine.

“All Saints Day is Nov. 1,” Hooks continues. “All Saints Day was a day to commemorate loved ones who have trusted Christ, whose eternal destiny you’re sure of, because you know the profession that they made and the trust that they put in Christ,” he says. “It’s a day to remember them even though they’re not a canonized saint. “

And while that may not necessarily evoke images of tombstones and cobwebs, other accounts suggest that the holiday has its roots in a Pagan festival celebrated by the Celtic-speaking tribes of the British Isles. The fest is said to have celebrated the coming of winter, and a large part thereof was satiating spirits, fairies and the dead, who were more easily able to visit the world of the living at this time of year.

For this reason, sacrifices of food, wine, crops, and in some accounts, humans and animals were made to ward off dissatisfaction from these supernatural beings. The Roman Catholics are then said to have established All Saints Day upon arrival in Britain to celebrate all souls which had lived saintly, but which may never have been canonized.

Nowadays, most will agree that neither the origins nor beliefs upon which the holiday was initially founded play a significant role in how it is celebrated.

“I think something is what you make it to be,” Hooks says. “I have friends who are Wiccan, I guess you could call that witchcraft. They do use that as a day to celebrate their faith, but that’s not what I use it for,” he says.

“There are a lot of churches doing things either tonight [Wednesday] or tomorrow night because they want to give people an opportunity,” Hutschinson says. “I don’t think churches are in support of Halloween, I think they like to use the opportunity of Halloween to share about Jesus by doing different events that draw people in, instead of focusing on the dark things.”

Like Hutschinson, Hooks considers the largely consumer holiday an occasion to pass on the teachings of Christ, and seeks to do so in an alternative manner. This year, he’ll be meeting with a youth group in his home to make hot dogs, and passing out gospel booklets pre-packaged with candy to curious trick-or-treaters.

“Paul says that whatever you do, it must be done out of faith and it must be done in such a way that it doesn’t cause other believers to stumble,” says Hooks, referring to the fact that some believers may find participation in the holiday wrong. “So if you’re conscious is clean and you have faith you are not participating in the worship of a false good, then it’s fine,” he says. “I have a clean conscience about putting a silly costume on and handing candy to kids, especially because I’m handing out gospel.”

Numerous churches all over San Angelo will be hosting ‘Trunk or Treat’ in their parking lots or fall festivals Thursday evening. Hutschinson is the Director of the Family Fun Night, which will take place at the PaulAnn Baptist Church Thursday evening at 2531 Smith Blvd. A list of other safe locations throughout the town for trick-or-treating may be found here.