On All Saints' Day

On Christmas, we see Santas and nativities.  On Easter, we see bunnies and crosses.  On Halloween, we see witches and pumpkins...  Wait!  No memorial candles or martyrs?  Whatever happened to celebrating All Hallow’s Eve?  Why doesn’t that Christian celebration have equal footing with the secular or pagan ones?

It may help to understand that All Saint’s Day dates from the early 600s (Wikipedia, “Halloween”), perhaps originating as a Christianized harvest or pagan festival—though not Samhain or Calan Gaeaf, as is commonly supposed, which are first recorded in the 10th century and from which we get a lot of our current Halloween practices of dressing up and extorting treats from others (Wikipedia, “Samhain”).  

The Catholic church still celebrates deceased saints during All Saint’s Day on November first, followed by All Souls' Day on November 2nd.  The former is a Holy Day of Obligation (a day other than Sunday when Catholics must attend mass).  The Eastern church, however, commemorates the saints on the first Sunday after Pentecost, and has done so since the late 800s (Wikipedia, “All Saint’s Day”).  Protestants, if they observe it at all, remember saints both past and present.  
As the United States is peopled with more Protestants and unbelievers than Catholic and Orthodox Christians, perhaps it's no wonder most Americans do not observe All Saint's Day or see advertisements in churches and stores.  Maybe we’d hear of All Saint’s Day more if we were Catholic or lived in a country that had it instituted as a national holiday, but for most, All Saint’s Day seems no more than a footnote in the history books.  A few Christians might buy flowers to put on graves.  The rest either stay at home with the porch light off, visit the local Judgement House, or gear their children or grandchildren up as princesses or superheroes to gather goodies from the neighbors.

It’s hard to say why the secularized pagan elements of Halloween have remained and the Christianized elements have just about disappeared, unlike at Christmas and Easter.  I suspect it may have to do with the way dressing up and collecting candy is a lot more fun than remembering all the loved ones we’ve lost.  

If Christians insist on observing such secular practices, I do wish more would dress up like penguins or Totoro instead of ghouls or criminals.  Why don’t more people decorate their yards with benevolently smiling pumpkins and shiny unicorns instead of scary fake corpses and large spiders?  *Shudder*

Though as for that, should Christians celebrate such a secular—and previous pagan—holiday at all?  Sure, few people still engage in pagan worship on Halloween, but how innocent are the secular practices, really?  Should we urge our brothers and sisters in Christ to celebrate All Saint’s Day instead?  Or would it be better not to celebrate either one?  

Scripture never tells us to remember the dead—nor Christ’s birth nor death, for that matter.  Scripture doesn’t forbid non-biblical celebrations, either.  We like to have things to celebrate and to mix up our routine.  If it’s wrong to celebrate a secular Halloween, is it also wrong to celebrate such events as Thanksgiving and Veteran’s Day and Talk Like a Pirate Day?  If it's wrong to celebrate All Saint's Day, is it also wrong to celebrate Christmas and Easter and Pentecost?

I believe this falls under the “disputable matters” category Paul spoke of in verse one of Romans 14.   He states in verses 5-11, 

“One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God.  For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself... we are the Lord's. For to this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.

“Why do you pass judgment on your brother?  Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God; for it is written ‘every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God’” (ESV).

and later,

“For if your brother is grieved by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love. By what you eat, do not destroy the one for whom Christ died… So then let us pursue what makes for peace and for mutual upbuilding… [W]hatever does not proceed from faith is sin” (v 15, 19, 23b).

I suppose that the real questions, then, are “Does my style of observing a particular holiday glorify God?”  “Do my actions trouble or edify my brothers and sisters in Christ?" and "Do my actions present outsiders with an accurate view of the Truth?”  

How would you answer?  Put your comments down below.