All Hallows Eve....

On this evening children are trampling the streets with adults (many of whom will not have undertaken risk assessments or had CRB checks) pestering with people with threats of "trick or treat" in the expectation that these people.... many of them vulnerable elderly people.... will have stocked up on sweets with which they can ensure that nothing nasty happens to their house, garden, car or person.


These young people are dressed as witches and wizards, vampires and Frankenstein's monster, and all many of other creatures that have as little to do with light and goodness as is possible. As fast as many organisations are ditching any official recognition of Christmas they are embracing and even encouraging children to celebrate the forces of darkness. "Oh, but the children love it," said one mother to me. Of course, the reality is that these parents are trivialising evil and do not understand that this simply is not Christians being party poopers.


Many years ago I went to see a family about baptising their toddler who was less than two years of age. During the visit the said toddler came into the sitting room and proceeded to switch the television on and the video recorder, then to insert a video cassette into the player and press play. As the toddler sat down the mother informed me "Oh, X likes this one" and lo and behold up came the title of the film on the screen: "Poltergeist." With such an appalling lack of parental responsibility today, bolstered by companies out to make a profit (even M&S !) and encouraged by educationalists and others in positions of power and influence it does not take a lot of working out to see why we have so many problems in society today.


Of course, it is all to easy to identify the problem, but The Church needs to be more proactive in countering this situation. Simply condemning it will not work. Perhaps leading by example would be better. We need to recover the observance of ALL HALLOWS EVE and see it as a festival of light and goodness.


Here at the Vicarage we have tried to do our bit to reverse the trend and hope to pass this practice on next year to all of our folk and who knows, perhaps it might catch on elsewhere - and others may have good suggestions too. What we did was buy a large pumpkin (why should it be used to make ghoulish faces?) and, having hollowed it out the Holy Name of Jesus and a Cross were carved in it. This evening it was placed outside the front door with a living flame inside. Unfortunately, the flash on my camera is a tad too powerful and the effect of the light shining through the Holy Name is not brilliant but I hope this picture gives you an idea of what we did.