Halloween, should Christians celebrate it?

[Bulldoggy22]

My family has never celebrated it, due to its pagan origins, but I know not everyone thinks that way. Just curious on how many would, or would not celebrate it.


(oops, I think I placed this in the wrong section)

[ccgr]

I moved it for you. We do carve pumpkins and let our kids go trick or treating, we just don't let them dress up in undead or evil costumes.

[ArchAngel]

I should note:

Both Christmas and Easter have pagan origins as well. The Catholic church, with it's strong marketing arm, repurposed those festivals for Christianity. The name Easter itself is believed to be named after the germaniac Goddess of the Dawn, Eostre. Halloween was brought in just the same.

But look, here's the thing. I don't want to supplant those holidays for you. But these holidays have massively evolved, from both the times when the Catholic church took them over till today. Even when the early church celebrated them, they were often shrouded in superstition. Now, we see it as a time to celebrate, come together and enjoy ourselves.

Growing up, my family stopped celebrating Halloween because somebody convinced my parents it was bad. But now, with my first year in a house in a nice neighborhood with a lot of young family and children, my wife and I hosted trick-or-treaters. I had a great time. We got the black lights up, dressed up as a Mad Scientist, and sipping a glowing glass of tonic water as we passed out candies. And you know, it was a great community building event. I enjoyed it more than the halloween party we had last week. I'm a bit bummed out that my family spent all those nights with the lights turned off to avoid trick or treaters. We spent a night trying to push people away when we could have a great time meeting our neighbors and having a great time. They probably spent yesterday night doing the same, but I had a great time with my neighbors.
And let me tell you, some of those kids were straight up adorable.

So, you know how people talk about how Christmas is no longer about Christ and is "so commercialized." Well, if you want to talk about the pagan origins of Halloween, it's not even recognizable. And this point, it's a completely different holiday. And sure, if your church hosts a harvest festival, go to that! Those can be a lot of fun, but if we're all going to be honest, that's really not much different than just celebrating Halloween. It's already been switched up by the church, now it's just doubled over.
Actually, calling it the harvest festival is more in keeping with old pagan festivals celebrating harvests. Halloween comes from Hallowed evening, or Holy Evening. The name is literally a christian name.

[ArcticFox]

I agree with ArchAngel. (The Horseman draw near...)

To avoid Halloween on the grounds that it's pagan is utterly inconsistent if you celebrate Christmas on 25 December. Jesus was born sometime in April. The Medieval Church did indeed move the celebration to the Winter Solstice in order to help ease the conversion of pagans in ancient Europe. If you decorate your house with any of the following things during Christmas, you're using pagan symbols:

Holly
Christmas Trees
Candles
Mistletoe
Ornaments
Snow
Lights

If you have a Christmas dinner, you're celebrating a pagan tradition.

Easter, as Arch said, is also a pagan thing and it's filled with pagan images. Rabbits and eggs have nothing whatsoever to do with the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. They were shoehorned as symbols into the notion of Jesus regaining His life but in actuality they're pagan fertility symbols. Easter basket? Pagan.

So, if your household celebrates Christmas in April, does not decorate for either Christmas or Easter, and avoids Easter Egg hunts, then and only then is it consistent to avoid Halloween.

[Oblivions_Key]

Yup, Holloween, Easter, Christmas etc are all pagan holidays, and me and my family do not celebrate them.
Really it comes down to whether or not you want to believe some of God's word, or all of it.
Jesus wasn't even born in December.. It was more like September.
It seems a long time ago people tried to duct tape random Christian events or holidays to pagan events or holidays and call it good.
We certainly celebrate His actual death, burial and resurrection though!
It's extremely easy to just do what everyone else is doing, whose parents and grandparents have been doing it, whose great grandparents etc etc etc..
Without actually sitting down to think about what all the pagan symbols and celebrations going on around you mean, and why Christians try to play along and make it "ok".
The Bible clearly states we are not of this world and are not to conform to it, or take on the appearance of it.

But anyway, off my soapbox I go now..

[ArchAngel]

Well, it's a bit more than duct tape. They straight up usurped it. But hey, I got Christmas, so I'm not complaining.
I find that a shame when people refuse to celebrate these holidays. There's a lot of good and enjoyment to be had with them, and it seems like a lot to miss out on for reasons I've often seen characterized as self-righteousness. (I make no specific comments about people here, just so I'm clear)

If I may, my understanding of "not of this world" when I was a Christian was about a godly perspective and not on the world. It's often mischaracterized by people who look at the world as markers to be different by. If you try making yourself "not of the world" by looking at the world, isn't the world just defining you in the end?

Like meat sacrificed to idols, does it not really matter if it had a pagan origin. It is what you celebrate it to be.
Well, that reference was Paul saying he could eat meat sacrificed to idols because it doesn't matter. It's just meat. But, if it were a stumbling block to a brother, he wouldn't.
But, whose going to stumble over a celebration of Christmas or Halloween? How many people are going to confuse your putting up a Christmas tree with worshiping a pagan diety, or trick or treating on Halloween as communing with the dead.
Nobody, that's who. The holidays have completely changed.

They are demonstrably not pagan holidays anymore. We can barely piece together their origins, and the ones we celebrate now are most clearly founded on Catholic holidays.
Celebrate them as you will.

Out of curiosity, when do you celebrate Jesus' birth, death, and resurrection?

[JOJ650s]

Out of curiosity, when do you celebrate Jesus' birth, death, and resurrection?

Well, I would say everyday,
but I know that's not what you meant.

[Bulldoggy22]

I didn't expect so many replies. My parents chose to exclude me from halloween, because they didn't want me involved with seeing all the 'death' decorations and costumes that my entire neighborhood wears. (We are basically the only Christians in our neighborhood I believe) At least, thats my theory. When I'm married, I will do something on that day with my kids, It would all depend on what neighborhood we get into though. I celebrate Christmas, usually not with all the extra decorations and hype however, and we always focus on Christ's birth on that day, not giving presents, although we give out presents as well. I celebrate it on the normal day, December 25th, I do not celebrate easter, in the sense of eater egg hunts and bunny rabbits, and I never have. I know Christ wasn't exactly born on December 25th, I just believe its a better time for us all to celebrate it since it already is universally accepted as that. I didn't expect everyone to say they do celebrate it, or at least want to celebrate it, most Christians I ask say otherwise. (I never asked through the Internet however) Although I agree with you, I still think it was best that I wasn't immersed in this holiday, or at least not immersed in it while I was young and impressionable. When I have kids, I would only celebrate it when they are older, and understand everything about the Holiday, including the fact that its 'ok' now. When I was really young, (forgot how old), we used to goto church to celebrate halloween, I don't know what happened with that, but my parents decided to exclude me from that as well, and they probably have good reasons, I just never asked. Anyways, thank you all for replying to my question

[Oblivions_Key]

Well, it's a bit more than duct tape. They straight up usurped it. But hey, I got Christmas, so I'm not complaining.
I find that a shame when people refuse to celebrate these holidays. There's a lot of good and enjoyment to be had with them, and it seems like a lot to miss out on for reasons I've often seen characterized as self-righteousness. (I make no specific comments about people here, just so I'm clear)

If I may, my understanding of "not of this world" when I was a Christian was about a godly perspective and not on the world. It's often mischaracterized by people who look at the world as markers to be different by. If you try making yourself "not of the world" by looking at the world, isn't the world just defining you in the end?

Like meat sacrificed to idols, does it not really matter if it had a pagan origin. It is what you celebrate it to be.
Well, that reference was Paul saying he could eat meat sacrificed to idols because it doesn't matter. It's just meat. But, if it were a stumbling block to a brother, he wouldn't.
But, whose going to stumble over a celebration of Christmas or Halloween? How many people are going to confuse your putting up a Christmas tree with worshiping a pagan diety, or trick or treating on Halloween as communing with the dead.
Nobody, that's who. The holidays have completely changed.

They are demonstrably not pagan holidays anymore. We can barely piece together their origins, and the ones we celebrate now are most clearly founded on Catholic holidays.
Celebrate them as you will.

Out of curiosity, when do you celebrate Jesus' birth, death, and resurrection?

Well, every day, but I also try to go by the best educated guess that people have come up with for the actual days of these events, and not the holidays typically associated with them. I get where you're coming from though, and you have a point, but I would still rather skip it all.
Basically we don't need a pagan holiday to have a special time, or do something special for someone else. And I personally don't believe that you can sanctify something pagan to make it ok.
I would like to learn more about the Jewish calender and the holidays found in the Bible like the feasts and such as well.
I hope I don't appear to be preaching to anyone in particular.. All I mean to say is my own personal beliefs

[Bulldoggy22]

Well, every day, but I also try to go by the best educated guess that people have come up with for the actual days of these events, and not the holidays typically associated with them. I get where you're coming from though, and you have a point, but I would still rather skip it all.
Basically we don't need a pagan holiday to have a special time, or do something special for someone else. And I personally don't believe that you can sanctify something pagan to make it ok.
I would like to learn more about the Jewish calender and the holidays found in the Bible like the feasts and such as well.
I hope I don't appear to be preaching to anyone in particular.. All I mean to say is my own personal beliefs

I respect that a lot, because it sounds hard to be able to do something like that.

[Orodrist]

I celebrated Winter's Night with the disablot and alfablot last night so....

Ya'll are some fake pagans.

[brandon1984]

I agree with ArchAngel. (The Horseman draw near...)

Laughed out loud on this one!

[ChickenSoup]

I celebrate the birth and resurrection how and when I want. That happens to be when everyone else does, particularly because I want to be able to grow close to my friends and family through the celebration of these things. I find the idea that God frowns upon this to be incredibly silly, and I don't buy into the suggestion that shunning anything makes me a better example for Christ.

[ohnolookout]

http://troublefacemom.com/2012/10/31/on-halloween/

That link is a pretty good summation of how I feel, and how I imagine I will bring my kids up in the future.

I particularly like this point:

Halloween is dark and scary and gory. Yes it is. But there kids and there are families, in every neighbourhood in my country and yours, who see, hear, and experience darker, scarier, and gorier things than Halloween all the time. Halloween is not scary to them because they have experienced real horror, and real terror. And believe it or not, Halloween, for some kids, is the LEAST scariest thing they’re going to experience this month or this year. For some kids, it’s the most fun and least threatening thing they will do. And so, if Halloween is the MOST scary night you can think of, or that you’ve experienced. You are blessed, my friends. And the world needs your light. It needs it bad.

[RedPlums]

My family likes to celebrate our Lord's birth and resurrection on Easter, and Christmas, and Thanksgiving, and New Years Day, and pretty much any other day of the year.

I think saying Christmas is pagan is going a bit far. December 25th originally was a day for the pagan religions to honor the sun and all that junk.
But the Church turned it around into a day of celebrating our Lord Jesus Christ's birth and resurrection.
Yes, we have turned Christmas into a greedy holiday of presents and food as humans. But I refuse to call it a pagan holiday. It is a day of celebration, and worship to our Lord.