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My first experience of Halloween occurred in the United States in 1980. My wife Janet and I had just arrived for a six-week stay – we were at the home of friends in Fullerton, Southern California. On Halloween, children came to the door and said, “Trick or treat.” I met them with a kangaroo puppet and gave them “lollies” and a Christian tract.

As I think back on that experience now, I realise that I did not know what Halloween was. It is a major event in the US. Most Americans are involved in it to some extent. Many churches have Halloween events.

In recent years, the celebration of Halloween has begun to increase in our country. It seems to me that our schools and kindergartens are one of the prime areas of the promotion of this. The latest reports are that it is increasing dramatically in popularity in Australia.

The word “Halloween” has its origins in the Catholic Church. It comes from a contracted corruption of “All Hallows Eve”. “All Hallows Day” or “All Saints Day” is a Catholic day of observance in honour of the departed saints. For this reason, some people think that Halloween has Christian origins. It does not.

It needs to be said that Halloween is, for many people, a fun occasion. They mean no harm by it, nor do they want to promote anything that could be harmful. But as we will discover, there is a lot more to Halloween than meets the eye. This leads me to ask, “Is Halloween fun or folly?” That is what I want to answer here.

The Origins of Halloween

Our modern celebration of Halloween is a descendant of the ancient Celtic fire festival called Samhain. The word is pronounced “sow-in”. The Celts were an ancient European people bound by a common language. They were settled over wide areas of Europe. The more modern Celts are identified with Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. Also, with Cornwall in England and Brittany in France. All these places retain indigenous Celtic languages.

Samhain was a significant festival that celebrated the close of the harvest and the preparation for winter (not relevant for Australia – our seasons being different from those of Europe).

The Celts were a pastoral people, and so the end of summer was significant for them. It meant that the structure of their lives would change. The cattle were brought down from the summer pastures in the hills, and the people prepared for long winter nights gathered in their houses.

Also, this festival was associated with the dead and the time of the new year. To the Celts, turning points – old year to new year, day, and night – were ‘magickal’ times. It was the time when the living could communicate with the dead. Because it was the time when the veil between the worlds was at its thinnest.  The dead were believed to be dwelling with the fairy folk. The fairy folk were often regarded as hostile and dangerous to human beings. The fairy folk were very active on Samhain – Halloween.

Samhain was a religious festival for the Celts. The priests of the Celtic religion were the druids. They played a significant role in the celebration of Samhain.  Divination was very important in this celebration. Sacrifices were important in Druidic rituals and especially at Samhain. Animals were used, and I have little doubt, so were humans. But some modern “pagans” dispute this.

So, from this brief overview, we can see that Samhain, Halloween, was a significant Celtic festival involving new year, harvest, and religious elements.

Trick or Treat?

In America, Halloween has found acceptance and become part of the culture. Halloween migrated to America with the Irish settlers who went there because of the Great Potato Famine in the 1840s. The custom of trick-or-treating is thought by some to have originated not with the Irish Celts, but with a ninth-century European custom called “souling”.

On All Souls Day, Christians would walk from village to village begging for “soul cakes”, made from square pieces of bread with currants. The more soul cakes the ‘beggars’ would receive, the more prayers they would promise to say on behalf of the dead relatives of the donors and so facilitate their release from Purgatory.

Others see links between “trick or treating” and the Druid priests who went from house to house on Halloween demanding food and pronouncing a curse if they were given none.

Either way, Christians should be very sceptical about the practice.

The Dark Side of Halloween

A certain Jerry Wilson, writing very positively about Halloween, says:

… Although some cults and devil worshippers may have adopted Halloween as their favourite ‘holiday,’ the day itself did not grow out of evil practices. It grew out of the rituals celebrating a new year, and out of Medieval prayer rituals of Europeans. And today, even many churches have Halloween parties or pumpkin carving events for the kids. After all, the day itself is only as evil as one cares to make it.

He has highlighted the problems very well for Christians. First, the Medieval Church was the most corrupt in the history of Christendom. Why would biblical Christians want to justify any practice based on the unbiblical practices of the Medieval Church?

Second, the Celtic origins of Halloween are what give me the biggest concern. Now this is something that is not popular today – to criticise things Celtic. Celtic things are well and truly in vogue. I am not anti-Celt. I have a lot of Celtic ancestry. Celtic ethnicity is not the issue. Celtic religion is.

The writer quoted above sees no problem with Celtic origins. I do. At the heart of the religious life of the Celts were the Druids, as I have already referenced. They had great control. One of them always accompanied the Celtic king and was a powerful influence upon him. They served as priests, prophets (divination was very important), magicians, doctors, lawyers, and poets. They were cruel, bloodthirsty, and superstitious, and there is good evidence that they practised human sacrifice. ^[1]

The Druids employed every known form of fortune-telling, and the people sought their help in trying to discover the future. Through magic, the Druids claimed to be able to change into animals and other shapes, to become invisible, to control the elements and the weather, and to produce fruitfulness. The people believed that the Druids could cause sleep, illness, or death by casting spells. The Druids also believed and taught a form of reincarnation.

Celtic religion was (and is) spiritistic and occultic. Its revival today is due to the general revival that we are seeing in pagan Wicca religion and witchcraft in general. Neopagans or Wiccans claim to be the fastest-growing religion in North America.  Neopaganism – the new paganism – is not concerned with true dogma but with rediscovering the ancient myths of the goddess, the sacredness of the earth and the forces of the earth.

Wicca is an old word for witch and means one who works with natural forces by shaping or bending them. Witchcraft, they say, is not an occult religion, which can lead to union with the powers of evil, but a way of entering union with the forces of the earth. Neopaganism aims to “whitewash” witchcraft.  But the truth is that from a biblical perspective, all the practices of Celtic religion, pagan ritual, Wicca or witchcraft are essentially condemned.

The dark side of Halloween is that Halloween is an ancient pagan ritual in which the forces of evil, the forces of anti-Christ, were operating. That is why cults and devil-worshippers love Halloween!

Also, that is why Christians should shun Halloween. As Paul says, “Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them.” (Ephesians 5:11)

The Bible and Occultic Practices

The term “occult” comes from the Latin occultus, meaning “hidden” or “secret.” Occult practices are often associated with hidden knowledge, magical practices, mediums, psychics, witchcraft, and mystical experiences. ^[3]

We read the following in Scripture.

Deuteronomy 18:9–14:

⁹ “When you come into the land which the Lord your God is giving you,
you shall not learn to follow the abominations of those nations.
¹⁰ There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire,
or one who practices witchcraft, or a soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer,
¹¹ or one who conjures spells, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead.
¹² For all who do these things are an abomination to the Lord,
and because of these abominations the Lord your God drives them out from before you.
¹³ You shall be blameless before the Lord your God.
¹⁴ For these nations which you will dispossess listened to soothsayers and diviners;
but as for you, the Lord your God has not appointed such for you.

Revelation 21:8:

“But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.”

Revelation 22:15:

“But outside are dogs and sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie.”

The Scriptures clearly condemn all forms of occultism and sorcery. ^[2] Hence, any support for or association with Halloween is not acceptable for a Christian.

Portals

Occult practices and, therefore, Halloween create occultic portals. Occultic portals are conceptual gateways believed to connect our physical world with other realms, dimensions, or spiritual planes. These ideas are rooted in esoteric traditions, mystical philosophies, and metaphysical beliefs rather than empirical science.

Note the following about occultic portals: in occult and metaphysical contexts, a portal is a spiritual doorway that allows passage between different states of reality, such as the material world and spiritual dimensions.

These portals facilitate:

• Communication with spirits or entities
• Astral travel or out-of-body experiences
• Alternative spiritual awakening or transformation.
• The possibility of demonisation.

What do we do with Halloween?

For many people, this coming Friday will be a time to have fun under the guise of Halloween. It will be nothing more than that. Another little diversion to escape the boredom of modern living.

But sadly, it will not be only that. It will be a rallying point for the forces of darkness to afflict and influence serious devotees, and so to increase their general influence in our society. So, Halloween in fact is not fun but folly!

Paul told us what we are to do with the forces of evil. He sets it out well in Ephesians 6:10–20.

Note this: We are in a spiritual war, and Halloween is an event that the devil will use to deceive people.

I offer two practical things that we can do.

• We can give children a tract when they come to our door. We can use this as an opportunity to share the good news.
• We are to pray – Ephesians 6:18–20. Churches can gather for special prayer meetings in the week leading up to Halloween.

I remind you as to what happened with the early church. Acts 1:12-14:

¹² Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet,
which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day’s journey.
¹³ And when they had entered, they went up into the upper room where they were staying:
Peter, James, John, and Andrew; Philip and Thomas; Bartholomew and Matthew;
James the son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot; and Judas the son of James.
¹⁴ These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication,
with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brothers.

The next event recorded after this was the outpouring of the Spirit on the Day of Pentecost!

There is power when we come together and pray. We can push back the forces of darkness as we pray.

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[1] National Geographic › Culture

[2] More Scriptures to consider: Exodus 7:11–12; 22:18; Leviticus 19:26, 31; 20:6, 27; 1 Chronicles 10:13–14; 2 Kings 21:5–6; Isaiah 2:6, 8–19; Jeremiah 27:9 – 10; Zechariah 10:2; Malachi 3:5; Acts 8:9ff. 16:16ff 19:19; Galatians 5:16–21; 2 Timothy 3:8.

[3] I do not discount mystical experiences that are grounded in Christ. The mystical experiences referred to here are those that are a result of occult practices.

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Image courtesy of Adobe.