At this time of the year, we celebrate a triduum of feasts to begin the season of Autumn: Halloween, All Saints Day and All Souls Day. In conservative religious circles Halloween is often written off and sometimes even condemned as a pagan practice. Well, it is pagan, and it’s very popular. I think of it as a playful introduction to two days of spiritual celebration.
The pagan festival of Halloween celebrated the end of summer, the harvest and the beginning of the cold, dark winter. It was believed that as autumn arrived the veil separating the living from the dead was at its thinnest. People lit bonfires and dressed in costumes to ward off the roaming spirits. The Church was drawn to the festival and expanded it with two special days.
The Church celebrates the feast of All Saints Day, the day after Halloween, by commemorating the host of men and women who brought God’s light into this dark world through their Christian witness. As the gospel of John tells us, “What came through him was life, and this life was the light of the world. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” Bonfires and costumes won’t keep the darkness away. Our sharing the divine light which is the very
essence of God, will be our shield against the darkness. On All Saints Day we celebrate the divine life within us.
The next day, all Souls Day, the Church brings us to the veil that separates us. There, we remember the souls who have departed this world and send them our light. This is a healing light, a redemptive light, the powerful light of love. Our souls are the repository of love. We come into this world filled with divine light. But sadly, as we mature, we tend to lose our connection with that light. We become more and more conscious of the physical world we live in and become less and less conscious of the world within, the spiritual world of the soul. That’s why souls sometimes need a loving push, a shot of divine light, to pass through the veil.
Halloween joyfully acknowledges life beyond the veil. All Saints Day canonizes that life by celebrating it as our goal. All Souls Day completes the triduum with a communal, loving nudge for souls who are hesitant to take their first steps into the divine light.
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. Amen.
