Hallowe'en's Teachable Moment
In this week's blog, I'm taking a break from sharing my thoughts on Sunday's Gospel, to reflect on an annual tradition for me.
You see, over the past thirty years as a teacher, administrator, and especially as a religious education consultant, I've had to answer the following question, in one form or another:
"Should we be celebrating Hallowe'en in a Catholic school?"
For me the tradition is not Hallowe'en -it's talking or writing about it that's my tradition!!
And I'm happy to do it.
I hope my little ramblings here will provide some sound advice for teachers and parents, and anyone else who wonders:
"Why does Canadian Tire have all their Hallowe'en and Christmas stuff out, and I'm still planting bulbs in my garden???"
(OK, that's probably not first on your mind when you reflect on Hallowe'en.)
Notice how I'm adding the apostrophe? The Blogger dictionary doesn't like it- it would prefer that I would type it as "Halloween" - no apostrophe.
I refuse.
Why?
Because with the apostrophe, we get at the heart of the matter. Hallowe'en is a shortened name for All Hallow's Eve- the evening or "vigil" before two of the great feasts in our Church year- All Saints Day and All Souls Day.
Vigils before feast days and holy days are quite common in our Church year- the greatest of these is Holy Thursday, when we begin our holiest days- the Easter Triduum.
Hallowe'en, however. never got quite that much respect to be an "official" vigil of the Church, although special prayer services are certainly celebrated in various countries on October 31st.
But basically, Hallowe'en became a "street vigil" for want of a better term. And many of the traditions (trick or treat, disguises and masks, bonfires, jack-o-lanterns) have their roots in "pagan" harvest festivals.
But like most of our Christian traditions, you can find the adaptation of cultural customs in them. The "profane" then becomes "sacred".
Unfortunately, the "profane" often takes it back. So you can celebrate Christmas without celebrating the Incarnation of Christ, or celebrate Easter without the Resurrection.
Give us presents and candy, but don't give us Jesus.
In some ways this is what happened to All Hallow's Eve. When it came over to America via the Irish and German immigrants (mostly), it soon morphed into a fun thing to do with and for kids.
It soon lost the connect between the night and the next two days.
So we forgot that dressing up as a ghost or a witch or even Satan himself showed that evil had been conquered by Jesus!
Going around in the darkness to houses with lit candles was to remind us of that.
We simply forgot.
And with good old free market capitalism, we now have a crazy assortment of costumes, candies, decorations, Hallmark cards, and REALLY BIG inflatable creatures you can get at Canadian Tire!!
Some of the costumes, thanks to Hollywood, became very gruesome and violent ( Mommy, can I please go as that serial killer on Friday 13th?? He's really cool! I'm not sure who is the scare du jour this year- Miley Cyrus???) So there has been a real pull back form Hallowe'en from some Christians, and some Catholic Christians, that our kids should not be involved in it at all.
So getting back to the original question, "Should we be celebrating Hallowe'en in a Catholic school?" My answer is "yes" with some important provisos:
1. October should not be "Hallowe'en month" in a Catholic school. I'm sure this doesn't happen in your school, but I've been into some Catholic classrooms that look like Canadian Tire- as soon as October 1st comes around, the classroom is entirely
spooked up. Now there are some classrooms that will have a "Thanksgiving motif" until mid-October, and then go all Hallowe'enie. My recommendation- Jazz up the class for maybe the last week. What to do in the meantime?...
2. During the month of October, connect with Church's year. I mean we should be doing this every month, but October is jammed packed with important days!
October 2nd -Guardian Angels!
October 4th- St. Francis of Assisi!
October 7th- Our Lady of the Rosary!
October 15th- St Teresa of Avila!
October 16th- Saint Marguerite D'Youville ( Canadian)!!
October 18th- Saint Luke!
October 28th- Saints Simon and Jude!
Which brings me to an important little rant,
3. Give more importance to All Saints Day than to its vigil, Hallowe'en.
For the past fifteen years before I retired, our district would not have children attend school on November 1st. Why? Because that would be the date set for the ATA local teacher's "Institute Day", and as part of the local, the Catholic district had little say in setting the date. It was thought that this was the best day for such an event, because the kids would be strung out or OD'd on too much candy, so it would be better if they stayed at home on November 1st.
(Great. Teach the kids that you can't have a fun night without being hungover the next morning, so you should stay at home.)
It drove me nuts that we couldn't celebrate in our schools this important part of our faith- "the communion of saints". So, if you are lucky enough to be in school on All Saints Day, spend the day celebrating. Wear Saint costumes! Tell stories of their lives! Eat Hallowe'en candy!
4. Make Hallowe'en the teachable moment. Let kids know some of the history, and have older kids do some research. If your having class parties or school dances, make some rules about appropriate costumes. The violent stuff is bad, but have you ever gone into one of the Hallowe'en stores and looked at the costumes for girls and women? Yikes, I wasn't kidding when I mentioned Miley! There are definitely some teachable moments about consumerism, sexism, and exploitation!
Finally,
5. Don't be a Hallowe'en Grinch. Everyone needs to make the best choices for their kids, and if you think that Hallowe'en is the devil's playground, you need to protect your children.
But do give some thought to my Hallowe'en ramble.
Personally, I think the devil takes the upper hand when we refuse to make fun of the darkness on Hallowe'en. We're suppose to laugh at the spooks and goblins- courage is one of the gifts of Spirit. And this is the teachable moment. No matter what really scares us- there is no darkness that will stop the LIGHT!!
I'm glad that more and more neighbourhoods are having local parties for kids rather than having them go door to door. It saddens me that children today do not live in the trustworthy environment that I had when I was filling up my pillowcase with candy, going door to door with my brothers.
That was different time. And prudence is also a gift of the Spirit. So always make sure your kids are safe!
Catholic educational leaders should always being mindful of their school's Catholic culture. With my five suggestions in mind, All Hallow's Eve can have it's proper place in the cultural life of a Catholic School.
Make it a teachable moment.
You see, over the past thirty years as a teacher, administrator, and especially as a religious education consultant, I've had to answer the following question, in one form or another:
"Should we be celebrating Hallowe'en in a Catholic school?"
For me the tradition is not Hallowe'en -it's talking or writing about it that's my tradition!!
And I'm happy to do it.
I hope my little ramblings here will provide some sound advice for teachers and parents, and anyone else who wonders:
"Why does Canadian Tire have all their Hallowe'en and Christmas stuff out, and I'm still planting bulbs in my garden???"
(OK, that's probably not first on your mind when you reflect on Hallowe'en.)
Notice how I'm adding the apostrophe? The Blogger dictionary doesn't like it- it would prefer that I would type it as "Halloween" - no apostrophe.
I refuse.
Why?
Because with the apostrophe, we get at the heart of the matter. Hallowe'en is a shortened name for All Hallow's Eve- the evening or "vigil" before two of the great feasts in our Church year- All Saints Day and All Souls Day.
Vigils before feast days and holy days are quite common in our Church year- the greatest of these is Holy Thursday, when we begin our holiest days- the Easter Triduum.
Hallowe'en, however. never got quite that much respect to be an "official" vigil of the Church, although special prayer services are certainly celebrated in various countries on October 31st.
But basically, Hallowe'en became a "street vigil" for want of a better term. And many of the traditions (trick or treat, disguises and masks, bonfires, jack-o-lanterns) have their roots in "pagan" harvest festivals.
But like most of our Christian traditions, you can find the adaptation of cultural customs in them. The "profane" then becomes "sacred".
Unfortunately, the "profane" often takes it back. So you can celebrate Christmas without celebrating the Incarnation of Christ, or celebrate Easter without the Resurrection.
Give us presents and candy, but don't give us Jesus.
In some ways this is what happened to All Hallow's Eve. When it came over to America via the Irish and German immigrants (mostly), it soon morphed into a fun thing to do with and for kids.
It soon lost the connect between the night and the next two days.
So we forgot that dressing up as a ghost or a witch or even Satan himself showed that evil had been conquered by Jesus!
Going around in the darkness to houses with lit candles was to remind us of that.
We simply forgot.
And with good old free market capitalism, we now have a crazy assortment of costumes, candies, decorations, Hallmark cards, and REALLY BIG inflatable creatures you can get at Canadian Tire!!
Some of the costumes, thanks to Hollywood, became very gruesome and violent ( Mommy, can I please go as that serial killer on Friday 13th?? He's really cool! I'm not sure who is the scare du jour this year- Miley Cyrus???) So there has been a real pull back form Hallowe'en from some Christians, and some Catholic Christians, that our kids should not be involved in it at all.
So getting back to the original question, "Should we be celebrating Hallowe'en in a Catholic school?" My answer is "yes" with some important provisos:
1. October should not be "Hallowe'en month" in a Catholic school. I'm sure this doesn't happen in your school, but I've been into some Catholic classrooms that look like Canadian Tire- as soon as October 1st comes around, the classroom is entirely
2. During the month of October, connect with Church's year. I mean we should be doing this every month, but October is jammed packed with important days!
October 2nd -Guardian Angels!
October 4th- St. Francis of Assisi!
October 7th- Our Lady of the Rosary!
October 15th- St Teresa of Avila!
October 16th- Saint Marguerite D'Youville ( Canadian)!!
October 18th- Saint Luke!
October 28th- Saints Simon and Jude!
Which brings me to an important little rant,
3. Give more importance to All Saints Day than to its vigil, Hallowe'en.
For the past fifteen years before I retired, our district would not have children attend school on November 1st. Why? Because that would be the date set for the ATA local teacher's "Institute Day", and as part of the local, the Catholic district had little say in setting the date. It was thought that this was the best day for such an event, because the kids would be strung out or OD'd on too much candy, so it would be better if they stayed at home on November 1st.
(Great. Teach the kids that you can't have a fun night without being hungover the next morning, so you should stay at home.)
It drove me nuts that we couldn't celebrate in our schools this important part of our faith- "the communion of saints". So, if you are lucky enough to be in school on All Saints Day, spend the day celebrating. Wear Saint costumes! Tell stories of their lives! Eat Hallowe'en candy!
Finally,
5. Don't be a Hallowe'en Grinch. Everyone needs to make the best choices for their kids, and if you think that Hallowe'en is the devil's playground, you need to protect your children.
But do give some thought to my Hallowe'en ramble.
Personally, I think the devil takes the upper hand when we refuse to make fun of the darkness on Hallowe'en. We're suppose to laugh at the spooks and goblins- courage is one of the gifts of Spirit. And this is the teachable moment. No matter what really scares us- there is no darkness that will stop the LIGHT!!
I'm glad that more and more neighbourhoods are having local parties for kids rather than having them go door to door. It saddens me that children today do not live in the trustworthy environment that I had when I was filling up my pillowcase with candy, going door to door with my brothers.
That was different time. And prudence is also a gift of the Spirit. So always make sure your kids are safe!
Catholic educational leaders should always being mindful of their school's Catholic culture. With my five suggestions in mind, All Hallow's Eve can have it's proper place in the cultural life of a Catholic School.
Make it a teachable moment.
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