I'll bet a nudist colony takes all the fun out of Halloween

So the long days of summer are officially over. Samhain ("sow" "en", not "sam" "han") has arrived bringing with it the darkened days of winter. I don't normally dress up or get up to trouble on this night like most people do. Tonight is a magical night, one of the 4 most magical nights of the year. Its an 'in between' night when the dead walk among us & the veils between the past, present & future can be briefly lifted.

Traditionally, Halloween was one of the four fire festivals celebrated by the Paleopagans of Ireland & the UK, but when the church couldn't get them to stop celebrating their pagan day it did what it had done often enough before. It sprinkled a little holy water & gave it a new name. Not a new idea to the Roman Catholic church. It had done it to Valentine's Day, formerly Lupercalia, Easter which was Eostre & of course Christmas, old time Yule. The church not only co-opted sacred dates, it also did it to sacred places. Most of the great cathedrals of Europe were build on top of earlier Paleopagan shrines & sacred groves. By co-opting the day Pope Gregory hoped to quash the pagan celebration, He moved All saints Day from April to Nov 1st. But that didn't nor hasn't stopped anyone from celebrating the day of the dead.


Growing up, the night before Halloween was always Bonfire Night. One of my favorite nights of the whole year. Large communal bonfires were lit & the whole town danced, sang & celebrated into the night. Only much latter did I learn that I was participating in a very old pagan celebration. The Paleopagans of Ireland & the UK would light large fires on the night before Samhain to call the spirits of their loved ones home & to ward off any evil spirit that might try to cross over during this in between time. Here I was a Roman Catholic & a Pagan.

Today Halloween is more of a pop culture celebration then a sacred spiritual one. People dress up as their favorite movie star or Halloween icon. They carve faces out of large squash & send their children out in the middle of the night to go house to house begging for food & somehow manage to keep their dignity.

I'll admit, I partake in some of the poppiness. I watch The Great Pumpkin every year, you have to, as much as the communal bonfires were part of the Paleopagans ritual life, Charlie Brown is a part of mine. I look forward to watching Linus full of all his innocence & hope all year long. It gets me through, until the Charlie Brown Christmas.

Its all good fun. But if by chance when your out late tonight & you see some very strange people, dressed in kick ass costumes & having way too much fun, don't be alarmed. Tonight is only one of four nights a year that they get to come out and play. By morning they'll be gone & all will be right with the world again.