Halloween: Harmless fun? Trick or treat?

Here's my magazine article from October 2013.

“It's just harmless fun” is a phrase that we'll be hearing a lot over the next few weeks as people defend the activities around Halloween, but is it true?

The origins of Halloween are in the Druid and Celtic feast of Samhain which celebrated the end of harvest and the beginning of the dark period of winter. The boundary between this world and the world of the dead was thought to dissolve and the dead returned to earth and created havoc by playing tricks on people and damaging crops. When Christianity arrived in Britain, it attempted to 'Christianise' these and other similar celebrations around the world by talking instead of the 'hallowed' saints who have died. 1^st November became All Hallows (Saints) Day, and the day before, 31^st October became All Hallows Eve or Hallowe'en. However, despite this the pagan and occult origins of the celebrations never went away.

Today the celebrations of Halloween have little to do with Samhain, for many it's just a laugh, an opportunity to dress up and perhaps to get some free sweets. We might possibly object to Halloween because of its celebration of fear, and of causing fear; the anti-social problems and potential risks for children through 'trick-or-treats'; or the overcommercialisation of it. But there is something a lot more dangerous about Halloween than these.

Christianity teaches that the supernatural exists and that there are evil and malevolent spiritual forces in the world. Halloween celebrations both underestimate and overestimate the power of those forces. By trivialising their power and making it the stuff of funny costumes it may encourage people, especially children, to 'play' with ouija boards, tarot cards, horoscopes and other occult practices. This connects people with sinister forces beyond their control, forces whose only aim is destruction.

On the other hand, Halloween is the celebration of evil over good, of darkness over light. Christianity teaches that through his death on the cross Jesus defeated all evil powers, although they won't be finally destroyed until Jesus comes again. In the meantime, they are active in the world and although they are more powerful than we are, they are nowhere near as powerful as God is. In Jesus, good has triumphed over evil and light has defeated darkness. As we say in the baptism service as we give the person their baptism candle: “God has delivered us from the dominion of darkness and has given us a place with the saints in light. You have received the light of Christ; walk in this light all the days of your life.”

The 'treat' of Halloween is really a 'trick' to make us both forget the power of evil and also to think it more powerful than it is. Fun it may be, but harmless it most definitely is not.

"If these walls could speak..."

Here's my sermon for Broughton's Civic Service this year:

I think that I can say without fear of contradiction that this year has been a very interesting one politically! Whatever your opinion might be of the referendum, the party political leadership elections, the US Presidential race; whatever your opinion might be of these, they've certainly got people thinking and talking about politics in a way we haven't for many years. And this is no bad thing. But one of the consequences of this is that it has caused, or at least highlighted many divisions in our society and even between family and friends. So we gather today aware of our differences and perhaps wondering whether we do share much in common with our neighbour at all.

But what better place to gather at this turbulent time than here in St Mary's?  This year, as many of you are aware, we are celebrating our 950th Anniversary, although as Dr Kevin Leahy reminded us in his lecture here last night the church is certainly older than that.  Just think about the history that this church has been around for, as the old saying goes “If these walls could speak...”

The Norman Conquest, the Magna Carta, the Reformation, the Civil War, the Agricultural Revolution, the Industrial Revolution, two world wars, one world cup... the list goes on.  Loads of times of turbulence, loads of eras of uncertainty, loads of periods where communities and families were divided.  Yet this place has been a constant.

It's been a constant reminder that there is something bigger than us, something more stable and reliable.  Sometimes when the school children come in to look around this church we think about how big it is and how much bigger it would have seemed when it was first built and people lived in small single storey houses, perhaps made of wood.  We think about how extravagant and unnecessarily high it is and we think about two reasons for that. Firstly it was big enough to hold everyone in the village, everyone could find a place here.  But secondly, and most importantly, it reminds us of how big, strong and secure God is.

This year we've been able to help people rediscover their place here.  Last academic year the school children  and some of the staff each made a square or a leaf that have been put together to form the two banners either side of me.  They now have a very visible place within the fabric of the church, that will hopefully be there for many generations to come.  This weekend we had the parish registers out so people could find themselves and their family in the history books – part of the life of this church.  This is their church, this is our church and we all have a place in it.

When the children are thinking of words to describe this building they say things like 'welcoming', 'like home','peaceful', like another world', 'safe'.  This is partly because for almost a thousand years people have been worshipping and praying here and the presence of God can be felt here.  God, who is the true firm foundation for our lives; God, who loves us even if we think we're unlovable; God, who believes in us even if we don't believe in him.

In these uncertain times, we need places like St Mary's to remind us that although there have always been difficult times, both in our national and international life and in our community and families, even though there have been difficult times, these times pass.  We need places like St Mary's to remind us that despite our differences we can come together as a community because we are all welcome here.

But also it reminds us that especially in our darkest times we need Jesus the light of the world; in a time of confusion in leadership we need Jesus who is the truly wise King of kings; in our broken world we need Jesus who reconciles us to each other and to God; in our divided world we Jesus who is the only Prince of Peace and ultimately the only answer to humanity's problems.

Dabble, dabble, game or trouble?

Here's my article for the October parish magazine:

There's a fine line between vigilance and paranoia and between caution and hysteria and it's a line that I'm going to attempt to tread in this article.

This summer's gaming sensation has been Pokemon Go – a smartphone game where imaginary creatures and accessories are looked for and captured in real life locations.  Some have praised it for getting coach-potato gamers out of their houses and walking around, whilst others have pointed out the dangers of people walking onto roads or into streams; causing accidents or making themselves vulnerable to crime by playing the game.  A few people are warning of the spiritual damage that Pokemon can do.

This latter group look at the 'worldview' of the game. Pokemon is short for 'pocket monsters' and the Pokemon have different abilities, for example reading of minds, use of poison, mimicry, taunting, teleportation and hypnosis. The concept of the original game of Pokemon is that you capture these Pokemon, 'train' them and then 'summon' them to fight against other people's Pokemon.  This, they say, is very similar to the practices of summoning and trying to control spiritual beings and forces that are found in witchcraft, Wicca, shamanism and spiritism, all of which the Bible warns against.  They also point to the testimony of former witchdoctors such as Bautista who, with no prior knowledge of the game, identified some Pokemon with demons they had encountered.

However, whilst some of the underlying themes and concepts of Pokemon are based on unChristian and potentially dangerous worldviews, it is after all just a game.  The same can't be said, on the other hand for those who 'dabble' in witchcraft, Wicca, mediums, psychics, spiritism etc.  These are very real attempts to summon and control very real spiritual beings and forces.  The problem with these practices, apart from the dubious techniques used by some of the practitioners, is that although the spiritual forces are real, only demonic forces would use these means.  This is because God has forbidden these practices so no force for good would use them, despite them seeming to be harmless or even caring.  St Paul warns us the “Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. It is not surprising, then, if his servants also masquerade as servants of righteousness.” (2 Corinthians 11:14-15).

There is no such thing as good magic, the dead cannot be communicated with and spiritual forces are beyond the command of humans.  What will respond if you call on these things are evil spirits that we are unable to control.  However, the Bible records loads of occasions where Jesus demonstrated his power over evil forces, and ultimately “God defeated the spiritual rulers and powers. With the cross God won the victory and defeated them. He showed the world that they were powerless” (Colossians 2:15). If you have opened the door of your life to evil influences, the good news is that through Jesus that door can be shut and you can be set free from every evil force that wants to control you.