I’m taking back Halloween just like I reclaimed Columbus Day. 🙂
The root word of Halloween is “hallow” which means “holy” or “saint.” It’s the same word that Christians use when they pray The Lord’s Pray. There’s a phrase in this prayer that goes, “Hallowed be thy name” which means let’s glorify and honor God’s name as it’s sacred and holy.
Halloween is October 31. Halloween is the contraction of “All Hallows Eve” because it occurs on the eve of All Saints Day. The night before an important day is usually celebrated, like Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve. On Halloween, it’s customary to dress up in costumes but I like that in recent years, many Catholic schools here in the US have begun encouraging their students to dress up as their favorite saints.
Alice in Wonderland is my default getup but I still have time to change into a hanbok if I want to. I dare not dress up as a saint; I fear lightning will strike my rear end.
All Saints Day is November 1. This is the Christians’ feast day for saints, martyrs and other holy men and women of the Church.
Note: we Catholics do NOT worship these people. We just:
a) appreciate them for what they had done for God while they were alive,
b) thank them for being our role models in Christian living, and
c) ask them to intercede for us.
And if we’re named after saints, we ask them to support, guard, and pray for us. (It’s not easy being my patron saint so I feel sorry for her and pray extra hard.)
All Souls Day is November 2. And just like how the saints pray for us here on earth, we pray for the souls, especially the souls in purgatory. This is the time to visit deceased family members in cemeteries and spruce up their graves.
Don’t Korean do this, too, during their Chuseok and Solleal?
However, the difference is Christians do not venerate their ancestors. Just like with the saints, our dead kin are NOT worshipped. But we do remember their earthly life and pray that we’ll meet again in heaven one day.
It is said that trick-or-treating originated with the English knocking on doors and begging for bread or “soul cakes” in exchange for prayers for the souls of the dead in that household. Of course, nowadays, Snickers and Kitkat bars and M&Ms have replaced soul cakes.
These three days which Catholics dedicate to remember the dead is called Hallowtide.
So, Happy Hallowtide!
source: www.etsy.com/shop/barituscatholic
Thanks for this, @pkml3. I did not know it was a triduum. I looked it up using AI and below is summary. Just this year, some of our Catholic churches here are asking that children dress up as saints for Holy Mass. Perhaps there’s a move to reclaim the feast days from 31 Oct as well. 🙂
Deepseek AI says
“It’s a triduum (a three-day period of prayer) dedicated to remembering the dead: the faithful departed in Christ and the saints in heaven. The name comes from the Old English word hālga, meaning “holy one,” so “Hallowtide” essentially means the “Season of the Holy Ones.”
The three days together form a cohesive spiritual journey:
From Fear to Hope: It moves from the cultural reminders of death and evil (Halloween / All Hallows Eve) to the celebration of victory over death (All Saints’ Day) and finally to compassionate prayer for the dead (All Souls’ Day).
The Communion of Saints: All Hallowtide beautifully illustrates the core Christian doctrine that the living and the dead are connected in a single spiritual fellowship.
In summary, All Hallowtide is a three-day Christian festival focused on the themes of death, judgment, heaven, and hell, encompassing the popular holiday of Halloween and the more solemn holy days of All Saints and All Souls.”
Ah yes, @GB, the “communion of saints” or the bonds/links of the Christians still here on Earth with those who are already in heaven and those who are still in purgatory.
It’s in our Apostles’ Creed.
I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic Church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and life everlasting.
The Hallowtide connects all these those three separate groups/communities in one occasion.
People say that Halloween has pagan/Druid/Celtic/Samhain origins. That may be so; I don’t care. The important part is that the Catholic Church offered those people a better alternative, a better perspective of life, a better understanding of one’s purpose here on earth. That’s why Christianity spread in the Western world and their paganism and witchcraft faded away. No one is afraid of ghosts, witches and goblins roaming around on moonless nights. And when kids dress up as ghosts, witches, and goblins, they’re taking out — and conquering — the scary in those imaginary things. 😂
Happy Hallowtide! 🙏🏼
I learned something today! Thank you! ☺️
So awesome that I can now think of Halloween, All Saints Day and All Souls Day as a triduum.
We’re supposed to go to the cemetery today but it’s raining. 🙏🏼