Let me start off by being really honest. I didn’t want to write this, much less actually post it. This is generally not a topic I care to discuss in a public setting at all in any amount ever. There’s far too many opinions, judgements and arguments over this topic and frankly, I think there are more important matters to spend my mental energy on.
Although I’m pretty passionate about my own convictions on the matter for me and my family and I’m not afraid to share those thoughts in a private conversation, I also feel that this is probably one of those things that falls under the “personal conviction” category. Nevertheless, I can’t seem to shake the nudge to post these thoughts so I’m just gonna go with it and hope for the best.
What I’m about to share with you is my PERSONAL reasonings of why my family and I choose not to celebrate Halloween. If you don’t carry the same convictions, that’s fine – that doesn’t mean you are in the wrong. I don’t know if celebrating Halloween is a “sin” any more than the pride, judgement and condemnation that is usually accompanied by those that don’t celebrate Halloween is a “sin.”
I’m pretty sure I’ve heard all the historical, scriptural and technical data and theories used to debate this topic on both sides pretty much all my life and I’m not interested in rehashing all those arguments in this article. But I’ve never heard anyone express the same reasonings that I have – so perhaps this will provide a different perspective on the topic:
1. I personally hate Halloween.
It’s not about the origin of the holiday, how witches celebrate it, how it compares to the origins of Christmas, scriptural references, etc. Like I said, I’m not getting into the semantics in this article. This is a matter of personal preference for me in regards to how Halloween is depicted and celebrated in modern-day America.
For context, I didn’t grow up celebrating Halloween so I don’t have all those precious memories that other people talk about from their childhoods (more on this later). So when I walk down the aisle at Home Depot and my little girl screams in tears because an ugly motion-sensitive witch figurine cackled at her – it triggers the mama bear in me. Every Halloween aisle I pass through, every decorated house I drive-by, every special spooky event I see advertised all have the same thing in common to me – they are glorifying things revolving around darkness, fear, torment, evil and death – and those are all things that I spend my life overcoming and teaching other people to overcome so I’m just not interested in the entertainment value of it all.
I understand that I could choose to only do cute pumpkins, pretty princesses and superheroes and ignore the darker stuff – but to be blunt, I just don’t want to. I don’t even like the idea of my kids going to our neighbor’s door and telling them that if they don’t give them a treat that my kids are going to play a trick on them. I understand that it’s viewed as something that’s all in good fun, it’s just not for me – and I have no sentimental attachment to the holiday, so it’s very easy for me to just do away with the whole thing. Which brings me to my second reason –
2. I don’t feel like I missed out.
Because my parents didn’t celebrate Halloween, I never experienced the family memories of going trick-or-treating or the excitement of getting to decide on my costume or hanging out with friends, etc. When I tell people that, they usually pity me. They think it’s sad that I don’t have those memories.
But I don’t feel sad at all. My memories are just different. I remember us turning out all the lights and hiding in the den cuddled up in blankets, eating popcorn and snacks and watching a movie. I remember running through the house with my sister looking for hidden full-sized candy bars with money wrapped around them. I just remember the secure and empowering feeling that it was me and my family “against the world.” Nowadays, I don’t handle Halloween in quite the same way that my parents did, but those memories remained and they were really good memories and I wouldn’t trade them for anything.
I think that when something like Halloween is so ingrained into our culture and brings so many positive feelings and memories from our own childhood, it’s very difficult to not desire for our children to experience the same thing – but I just think there are other memories we can give our children.
3. It was the first opportunity I had as a human to “stand up for my faith.”
And this one is a big one to me. My entire Christian walk is about denying myself what I think I want in that moment and pursuing God for what I know I want in the long run. Halloween is the first time that I experienced this concept personally – and it provided that opportunity at a very young age. Although my parents explained the reasonings to me, as a child, all I could see is that all my friends were going out, having fun, dressing up (and I LOVE dressing up) and getting candy….and I was the weirdo who didn’t get to do any of it.
So one year, my parents gave me the choice, no strings attached (except probably some guilt lol), they just explained to me why they didn’t celebrate Halloween and then allowed me to make my own decision. I was so close to running out to catch-up with my friends but it was in that moment that something formed inside of me – an understanding I guess – that my life was not my own but I lived to please God and sometimes – most of the time – that means choosing not to do all the fun-looking things that the world does and being willing to be the weirdo.
That conviction stuck with me all my life – after giving up Halloween, my mind was set. And as a teenager, not taking the hit as I passed the joint (and was made fun of for “just saying no”) or not going out to drink with all my friends, etc, was easy. I had already accepted at 10-years-old that I was the weirdo and I was ok with that. And now as an adult, my willingness to make some pretty extreme foolish-looking decisions in obedience to God I think also stemmed from that moment I chose not to celebrate Halloween.
Now, please don’t mishear me, this is certainly not the only way to establish a Godly conviction in your life or your child’s life! And having that established early in my life doesn’t mean that I stuck by my convictions the rest of my life – I definitely had my seasons of deliberate disobedience. I also know plenty of people who celebrated Halloween and still celebrate Halloween with their families that seem to have incredibly strong convictions and I know people who didn’t celebrate Halloween as a child that are not living by those same convictions as adults.
It’s not about Halloween itself, I just feel that Halloween is one of the few opportunities available for a young child to full-scale experience being “set apart” – so although it’s not the only opportunity and it doesn’t guarantee that your child is “set for life,” I really enjoy the idea of utilizing it as a tool in raising my own children. It’s another way to help them understand what living for Christ might look like in their life. I feel the benefits of this far outweigh any negatives of them “missing out.”
4. All things are lawful but not all things are profitable.
This is my last point and probably my #1 reason and it has nothing to do with whether or not Halloween is right or wrong. **WARNING** probably gonna get a little preachy here.
This entire reason is based on 1 Corinthians 10:17-33 when Paul is addressing eating food sacrificed to demons and how God created all food and it doesn’t make it sinful for a Christian to eat it but that we should do things for the benefit of our neighbor and not for our own profit and if it is made known that a food was sacrificed to a false god then we shouldn’t eat it for our neighbor’s conscious’ sake and in doing this we become all things to all men, giving offense to no one so that “many will be saved.” That’s my quick paraphrase and I know it’s a mouthful.
Basically, maybe it’s not wrong to celebrate Halloween and maybe it shouldn’t matter to anyone what you choose to do with your family and maybe there are a lot of memories that bring your family closer together through Halloween. But I do believe that at some point in our walk with Christ, even if something is perfectly ok to do and we should be able to do it, that we recognize that we are not on this earth for our own personal enjoyment – we have all of eternity for that – we are here on this earth to show people the way to eternal life.
And at some point, unless God specifically directs you to do something, if there is something in your life that is causing division, confusion, or could be a stumbling block for someone else, then Paul calls us to walk away. That’s a hard thing to do. When there’s something we want to do and that we should be able to do even under God, but we decide it’s not worth the controversy to our witness and we sacrifice it. Not in a legalistic kind of way but in a way that softens our hearts and says that sometimes what we are holding onto with such a fight is simply not beneficial and it’s just not worth all the negative that comes out of it.
And sometimes when it comes to those things (it’s Halloween today, but it could be alcohol, entertainment choices or excessive luxuries tomorrow), we have to ask ourselves, why am I holding onto this so tightly? Usually, if we dig deep enough, yes, there may be some superficial benefits to all these things but deep down, we usually hold on as tightly as we do because of pride and selfishness.
I have found this to be true in my own life repeatedly and every time, when I finally get to the point that I’m willing to let it go, God shows up with something far greater in return.
So those are my thoughts. If you choose to celebrate Halloween, don’t feel condemned, if you choose not to, don’t get judgmental and if you see Halloween as a witnessing opportunity or anything in between, then you do what God has called you to do. These decisions are for each person to make individually. But no matter what guys, be kind and respect people’s right to make their own personal choices. Jesus never forced anyone to do anything – He loved and He called, it’s up to each person to determine what He’s calling us to do and whether or not we will follow.
Well said, Gloria.
So good