Halloween. Why do some Protestants in the US want to ban this Christian festival?

[Gwendoline]

A lot of religious Christian holidays have pagan roots. Should we ban Easter and Christmas too, Mexican day of the dead?

Halloween is 3 days in the Catholic calender, it was generally only celebrated by Scottish and Irish catholics but became culturally mainstream in America.

Hallows Eve or Halloween is the eve before All Saints day. Christians prepare themselves with a Nightly vigil and with fasting.

All Saints' Day is a holy day to honour all the saints and martyrs, it's a principal feast day in the christian church.

All Souls' Day is a day to remember and honour all the faithful departed Christians especially family members and friends.

Would you ban Christmas trees also? Easter Eggs? I can't see many Protestants in America adopting Jewish/Hebrew Practices.

[NamerOfStars]

The short answer is that they saw the, um, "fun" that fundamentalist Catholics were having in trying to ban things they disagreed with and wanted in. So they formed a new wing of Christianity, perhaps best referred to as "whiny bitch-assed Protestantism", and went from there.

In light of how many of their predecessors, and even ancestors, fled to this country, or what would become this country, that kind of religious intolerance is blatantly un-American. It's like when towns put up a "holiday tree" to avoid saying "Christmas". Do they garland it with the intestines of their slain enemies? No, which means it's not Yule, the only other relevant tree holiday in that part of the year.

I say you should go in the opposite direction. If you want to be "inclusive", then include MORE, not less. Put up a menorah, and a... whatever they do for Tet. Heck, what do they do for Christmas in parts of the world that don't have pine trees? I don't know, but hey, here's a chance to show everyone!

If your religion is an excuse to stop thinking, you're doing it wrong.

[Kaneki05]

Because the way it is not Christian, it's pagan.
All Saints’ Day was originally on May 13 not even close to October but to try dimmish pagan's beliefs they moved it to October while taking their practices hence Halloween.

But this also divided Christians because a lot disagreed with taking part in the occult celebration as it was more dark and disturbing, to no ones shock a lot of Christians had a problem with their kid dressing up as the devil thinking it's cool.
Or even having any association in anyway like witches to spells. These are all regarded as Satanism therefore not regarded as a good thing.

And that's the very basic story of why Halloween is so controversial within Christians and the sects.
Also they did the same thing with all the other holidays too moving their dates and taking the way it's celebrated from something else not their own just those were less hard to swallow as they didn't involved direct relationship with Witches and the Occult.

[Gwendoline]

Christians espicially the Catholic Church adapted Christianity to their own native culture and holidays. Early western Christianity was formed largely within the Roman Empire as a minority religion and rather than have separate holidays it was decided to hold Christian holidays on the same days as Roman cults like sol invictus and Saturn. The calender has also changed so whatever date any actual pagan festival was held no longer corresponds to the gregorian calender much like how eastern orthodox & coptic dates for Christmas are not the same as western Christianity or how thd Jewish calender has a different date for passover. Christmas for instance used to be on the winter solstice which in old calenders fell on the 23rd.

If you look at the history of Europe generally there have always been the s
same holidays religious or otherwise around Easter, October and December. In central and south America catholics was adapted by natives to fit in with their culture which is why you have the Mexican day of the dead, and pictures of jesus that look Mexican and more of a focus on Mexican and Spanish saints. Saint Diego is not saint we would hear much of in northern Europe.

[Kaneki05]

The pope at the time literally moved it to All Saints day to 1st November so Hallows eve would line up with the pagan belief. This is not a debate it's a historical documented fact.
It was not just due to some coincidence and they actively took the pagan practices and incorporated into their own Halloween.
And they repeated this again and again because it was effective cultural appropriation that worked.

[Gwendoline]

Originally all Saints day was celebrated on the 13th of may because it corresponded to a Roman festival.
The Irish & Catholic churches were celebrating all Saints on the 1st of October long before the Pope moved it, Irish Christian missionaries brought it the Francia and eventually the Pope moved it from the 13th of may to the 1st of November to bring into line with the Holy Roman empire as the holy Roman empire ruled most of Italy at the time. So the Irish and Scottish adapted Christianity to the irish/Scottish culture and then exported it Christian Europe and then the Pope adopted it for Italy suppressing the previous Roman Christian all Saints day on the 13th of may. Allowtide never took hold really in the saxon Christian church for instance or in eastern Europe.
Christians can't appropriate their own culture. Just because say someone in the us converts to Islam or budisim doesn't mean they have to throw out their American culture and that was the same for early Christians.

[Kaneki05]

No cause the Celts in Scotland were Pagan and were the ones who celebrated it on 31st not Christians, then the Christians came and stole their practices and dates from them.
It wasn't something Christians celebrated on those days then Pagans copied it that wouldn't make any sense.
Pagans there came before Christians remember that.

[Gwendoline]

The Christians came? Where did they come from? The Christians there were pagans that converted, they didn't steal their own culture.
An example I would give is when I go to mass in different countries. For instance mass in America is very American culturally differing from Europe, it's the same gospel but the culture differs.

[Kaneki05]

What do you mean where did they come from? They came from Rome lmao
The people who already existed on our England land to Scotland and Ireland weren't Christians they were all pagans, and celebrated their own unique holidays that had nothing to do with Christianity until Rome invaded in which they took our culture and made it their own.

Which means by no way was October/November the date they celebrated, as they moved it to copy the Pagans. They didn't copy themselves as in Rome they never once celebrated Halloween on those days.

[Gwendoline]

There were never any Romans in Scotland or Ireland. Where did the Christians in Rome come from? Did they come from Jerusalem?
The people that were in Ireland, Scotland, England and Wales converted to Christianity, they were still ethnically and culturally gaels, picks, Welsh and saxons

[Kaneki05]

Yes, Jerusalem in the Roman province of Judea. And yup they were, Pagans were converted and taken over by Christens that came from Rome.
Rome never invaded Ireland and failed with Scotland 3 times however there success in England was enough for Christianity to spread through and take our people by storm. They took the traditions of our pagan ways to make it easier for Christianity to establish it's self over pagans.

'The Roman invasion of Britain: The earliest campaigns, AD 43–7. In AD 43, the Roman emperor Claudius launched an invasion of Britain, and over the next 45 years the Roman army gradually extended its control over much of present-day England and Wales and ventured into territory now in Scotland.'

They textbook warped our land into something else entirely, which became a good foundation from Christians. This simply lead to celebrating holidays that were from the Pagans, such as moving dates in line and doing practices we had that Rome didn't have.
And that's the holidays you see today that Christians celebrate. They kept same names, and ideas of Saints, along with Jesus of course but the actual way it became celebrate was different to the very date been shifted to that of Pagan''s.

[Gwendoline]

Christianity disappeared from England after the Romans pulled out and the saxons, geets and angles invaded. It was reintroduced to England by Irish missionaries who also introduced it to Northern france.
Roman emperor claudius was a pagan as was most of Rome at the time with Christians being a tiny minority becoming the major religion in Rome until 300 AD and the Romans pulled out 100 years later. It was only in 635AD that Christianity came back to England thanks to Irish monks in linensfarm and iona, they were not Roman. The Roman catholic church though in communion with the Gaelic church celebrated religious holidays at different times and negotiated with each other to hold them on the same days.

[Kaneki05]

The Christian faith persisted in British society after imperial Roman rule had ended. Fifth-century Christian cemeteries and many early post-Roman inscriptions bearing Christian symbols attest to its survival.

But anyway the semantics of when Christianity took over don't matter, it did. And when it did they had took Pagan traditions and dates then put their own holiday over it.
Christianity celebration of Halloween is not the same to how it originally was in Rome or even whatever the Pagans celebrated here in England.
But I don't know how many times I can repeat the obvious.

Just look up Lemuria the original pagan holiday in Rome that Halloween came from. It wasn't started by Christians and never has been.

[Gwendoline]

Lemuria was a Roman holiday. The early Christians in the Roman Empire being romans themselves had their holiday on the same day to fit their Roman culture into their Christian faith.
The Christian faith disappeared in Britain for centuries when pagans from today's Denmark and Netherlands regions the saxons, angles and geets came, it was brought back by gaelic missionaries from Scotland and Ireland. You only have to look up the history of lindisfarne and iona, they also brought back reading and writing. This is well documented history of the British Isles, litteraly written in stone.

[Kaneki05]

Good for them I guess? But that has nothing to do with my point. I ain't arguing over when Christians took over or not.
And you just confirmed my point... Christians made a holiday on the same day as Romans already had because it wasn't there's in the first place.
They Christianized what wasn't there's like they always do.

[Gwendoline]

Yes because Christians in Roman empire for example were a minority but still Roman even if they were Christians. In Europe most of the cultures at the time though had different religions and traditions almost universally celebrated feasts, festivals and holidays around the same times and like wise the Jews do too though they don't line up exactly due to the differences between the Jewish calender and greogrian calendar.
Would you tell Muslim converts in America they can't fly the stars and stripes because they are islamifying American culture

[Kaneki05]

I mean the difference is Pagan from our land was seen as satanism.
The symbols and blood worship wasn't something Christians wanted. And it would be pretty weird that the Christians wanted to celebrate and dress up as witches considering they straight up killed people for such blasphemy of maybe been a witch or doing any such thing.
I could 100% bet no Christian back then was hoping one day we would have people dressed up as demons and witches as if it's a good thing. But that's we have no?

[purplepoppy]

America seems to be a place where everyone wants to be free to do as they please but ban everyone else from the same. I wonder how much of it is just tit for tat, you ban abortion, we'll ban Halloween.

[WhitneySnow]

Much as I love Halloween, it’s basically a pagan holiday honoring the unquiet dead

[Gwendoline]

Not so. It's the eve before All Saints day, all hallows. The rest is Irish and Scottish cultural tradition, much like Christmas or Easter.

[WhitneySnow]

Yes but I don’t think All Souls Day/All Hallows Eve is a Christian holiday. At best it was added to the liturgical calendar to appease the largely pagan Celtic population, for whom Halloween was a cultural tradition.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m a Christian and I love Halloween. I just don’t think it’s a Christian holiday.

[lightbulb27]

I like honouring all the saints. that never happens... lets start doing this... good reminder!

The real problem is candy and the cost of candy. The candy is total indoctrinating garbage that ruins kids inners. And I'm socially pressured to hand it out if they show up in a costume... He!! no! It's bloody expensive and terrifyingly bad for their bodies. It weakens immune systems and causes many illnesses post Halloween.

I won't even mention the tooth decay followed by horrifying sound of dentists drill.

So this year... lets hand out real food, chicken eggs... boiled, carrots, sweet potato sticks. The kids may cry but they will be better off.

It doesn't hurt to spend a few minutes casting demons out of 'em either... just sayin... probably got a few by age 5

It's offensive to dress up like a saint when we are funding the bombs going into Gaza blowing people to bits. So that's a no.

Just wear a mask... it's fitting for our modern society...

[Gwendoline]

Maybe don't hand out eggs...

[MrOracle]

Unlike Day Of The Dead, virtually no one in the US celebrates Halloween (aka All Hallow's Eve) in a religious sense, so whatever efforts are being made to ban it are virtue signaling at best. Exactly nothing is going to change, because it's a non-problem. It would be different if it WAS celebrated, or people were encouraged to celebrate it, in a religious sense, but it hasn't been for at least a century.

[Gwendoline]

Catholics do.

[MrOracle]

Most Catholics in the US don't observe Catholicism in any real religious way. Those who do represent a very, very small percentage of the overall US population. I'm really not concerned about their views on modern, non-religious Halloween celebrations.

[Gwendoline]

Not my experience I'm America as a Catholic

[andreasderjuengere]

To ''ban'' something is the pathetic admission that one has no inner and/or outer strength to convince otherwise.

If something needs to be counteracted, then it's the greedy commercialization of cultural traditions.

As for Americanesia (protestants, or other): I suggest to get busy with more important topics that were NOT born from feeling bored (and/or from having nothing important to do).

I meanwhile feel more inclined to agree to build Trump's wall - so that these guys over there are kept inside :D

With, or without Halloween.

[jshm2]

Cost of living crisis, mainly.

The cost of candy, decorations, electricity and "keeping up with the Joneses" is just too much for most average Americans.

It's nothing to do with "Christianity" as Jesus didn't do Halloween - most Jews don't.

[Gwendoline]

Jesus didn't celebrate Christmas or Easter either. Jesus celebrated Jewish holidays.

[nawtee_me]

With those names yes. (Easter- After Astarte who was the goddess of love, and fertility. Hence the bunny’s and eggs.) The Christian holiday is Passover. Christmas is the birth of Jesus. Halloween was an attempt to bring pagans to church to hear the gospel by celebrating O hallows eve which was a pagan holiday.

[Gwendoline]

Halloween and a lot of other Christian religious festivals were adapted by Christian converts to fit into their own culture, history and traditions. The last supper was a passover feast so doubly celebrated though the last supper has more importance to Christians and celebrated every Sunday. The last supper/passover on the greogrian calendar does not corespond to the same date as the Jewish calender or orthodox calender. Thd Jews will celebrate the passover on the 12th of April in 2025 and the Christians it's April 17th 2025.
Christmas is the same and originally celebrated on the winter solstice which used to fall on the 23rd of December and celebrated in the old Roman empire by early christians in the minority because other relgions in the celebrated a feast then and basically everyone was on holiday so no buisness or work could be fone, it made sense. In the west you start to see Hindus and buddists doing the same at Christmas, adapting the religion to western culture

[Bricealan]

Just another 'fringe' movement... ignore the idiots.

Now we can't have a sports team that has any reference to "native Americans' as it "offends' them ! Been offending them for 100 years ! ?

Now Halloween bothers someone !

Same kind of fringe movement bullshit and sadly the organizations go allow and roll over and play dead and that only encourages more of the same.

[AviatorTom]

They buy into the story that Halloween started as a pagan ritual, ignoring the fact that it's the evening before a Christian holy day, All Saints Day, when the dead are remembered. Like many Christian holy day eves, people celebrated before fasting on the holy day.

Bottom line... these people have nothing better to do than criticize others.

[strateguy632]

But that day was in month may until they injected pagan n changed label.

[Kaneki05]

It's not a story it's true. While the other is also true. All Saints day already existed, but it was moved from May 13th to October to try replace the pagan holiday they had, while taking their practices for their own.
It's what one calls cultural appropriation. And you find this to be a fact from one simple search.

[purplepoppy]

That's not true either, the celtic areas had been Christian for centuries long before the church renamed it Halloween. They produced hundreds of saints not one of which complained about the festival.

[Kaneki05]

Celtics weren't Christian until Christians came over here and converted us.
Everyone in Britain before rome got involved weren't Christians it wasn't a concept we had because we had no connection to juelusem at all before that.
But Pagans over here already celebrated a day on 31st October which is why the Christians moved their Saint day. Which Saint day actually all comes from a Roman tradition known as Lemuria. And Christians kinda combined Lumria and our Pagan stuff to make Halloween.

Making the point Christians would never of celebrated on 31st without our Pagan culture. And would of never of celebrated Saints day on 13th May without the Roman tradition Lemuria.

[Clara4567]

I found it stupid to ban something just because some people don't celebrate that.

But Halloween cannot be defined a Christian festivity, it has celtic origin, so it existed before Christianity.
If it was a Christian festivity it would have been celebrated in the majority of European countries, where the majority of population is christian, but it is not like that, so it is wrong to define it aspart of the Christian's celebrations.

To go back to what you asked, sometimes people aren't happy to see other people happy, so they want to ruin fun for the other.

[Fireguy17]

just tell them to get over it.
They have too much free time.
Just go out and have fun.
It's great to watch all of the little kids.
Our fire department puts 2 trucks out at different places to give out candy for trick or treat.
The kids love it and so do we.

[CuriousHubby]

Probably cause it went to far into evil and celebrating it.

Like how there is no merry Christmas it's happy holidays! 🎉.

People ruin good things cause they get pleasure from it!

[Gwendoline]

Happy holidays doesn't really work because you think summer holidays. Happy holidays in summer makes sense.

[worldscolide]

I find it comical that Christians believe that Jesus was born on December 25th during the festival of yule, when he was most likely born some time in the summer. Or that Easter happens conspicuously on the same time period as beltane.. There are a lot of "Christian" holidays that were stolen from the pegans which predate Christianity by thousands of years.

[TDDMS]

The only people I see trying to ban Halloween tend to be this foreign group of people who aren't native to Europe or America. In fact they tend to be dysgenic and see anyone who doesn't belong to their group as no different than cows. Oh and they like to play the victim.

[SeekerOfTruth007]

Halloween is a pagan festival for the worshiping of the false god Samhain (Pronounced Sawan). It has nothing to do with the real God, and neither does Christianity for that matter. "God is not a man" (Numbers 23:19). So both Christianity and Halloween are wrong.

[SeekerOfTruth007]

Also, Easter is based on the Ashtaroth cult, which the Book of 2 Kings states that "God hates the Ashtaroth worshipers".

[Gwendoline]

Easter is based on the crucifixion of christ, after all the last supper was a passover feast. Can you give an accurate date the pagans celebrated Easter using the greogrian calendar we use today? Christmas was celebrated on the 25th of December which used to fall on the winter solstice which is no longer the case as the winter solstice is the 23rd December.
Allowtide is 3 days celebrated originally by Christians in Ireland and Scotland, they fitted Christianity in with their ethnic culture.

[SeekerOfTruth007]

No. The holiday "Easter" is thousands and thousands of years before Jesus, and is based on the worship of the Ashtaroth cult, which was then renamed to "Ishtar", which was then renamed to 'Aphrodite". Do some research, kid. "Easter" is the false "Christianized" version of Ashtaroth worship. Also, all God-man cults are rebuked in the books of Numbers and Ezekiel as being provably false religions.

[Gwendoline]

The passover which jesus was celebrating is 3000 years old. If you look all through the history of Europe, eurasia, the middle east and north Africa all those countries have a festival around the time of Easter.

[SeekerOfTruth007]

You cannot be saved by the blood of a lamb. Isaiah said the real God HATES sacrifices.
You cannot be saved by the blood of a dead man claiming to be God either. Even James, Jesus' own brother, said you cannot be saved except by good works, which totally invalidates everything Paul and Jesus taught.

[Gwendoline]

The Hebrews were litteraly saved by the blood of the lamb.
Yes jesus, Paul, the apostles, saints and martyrs all did good works.

[SeekerOfTruth007]

Falsely teaching that a man was God is a sin. God is not a man. Claiming God is a man is blasphemy.

[Gwendoline]

The son of God. God is in all things.

[strateguy632]

Some oppose, nobody is trying to ban it.

Still in public school should be sensitive therefore not put Halloween stuff.

[Gwendoline]

But then that would be like a communist school sterile of any culture.

[Pete671]

Imho you answered your own question by correctly saying Halloween has pagan roots,,,

we were given free will, it's up to us to exercise it wisely,,,

So it not up to us to stop or allow others to recognise Halloween or any other festival,,,

[236color]

Why do they want to ban it? Once again, the crippling fear that someone, somewhere may be having a good time. Gasp!

[GoodGuyBreakingBad]

I'm Scottish Ancestry, and we still like and have celebrated Halloween, will most likely get some Halloween candy to celebrate this year.

[Dongie]

I had bad things happen to me in the late 80s and 1990 on Halloween so I stay in on that night.

[Gwendoline]

I know a few girls in England that had a bad night on Halloween they were walking past a local mosque on their way to a Halloween party.

[Dongie]

I bet they did.

So your an English lass?

[In_Trance]

I think you better check your facts because nobody wants to ban you either love it and celebrate it all the time or you don't give a shit about it and ignore it.
There is no movement to ban any holiday

[Dargil]

Traditionally, it is day before All Saints Day. Fundamentalist Christian's believe it celebrates evil. But Satan is defeated the next day.

[Sevenpointfive]

nice. are people that stupid as to not know their religion is jewish?

[genericname85]

i mean it really has nothing to do with christiantiy. but i feel like if people enjoy and have fun, what's wrong with that?

[Anonymous]

someone calling themselves Christian don't make them Christian

plenty of fake Christians trying to dilute Christianity with woke bullshit

[superchan2011]

Because their uptight assholes that just wanna ruin the spooky time of the year lol

[Likes2drive]

They all have bad backgrounds just like Valentine’s Day, but some people want to ban and cancel everything they think is bad even though they are the minority they still get things cancelled

[Gwendoline]

Well if you think about it there are only 365 days in the year to celebrate events. It makes good sense to share especially if yiu are a recent convert. Hindus, Jews and buddists have events in Oct-November time. Nearly everyone has some sort of event or harvest festival around that time.

[Likes2drive]

Yeah usually European country’s celebrate more things because those countries are older than the USA

[Gwendoline]

Not so. Americans have a holiday every month.

[Gwendoline]

Along with most European holidays

[Likes2drive]

Not many major ones. I only get a few of those a year off. we might get holidays where nobody gets the day off though every month is always something, but I never get Halloween Valentine’s Day or Columbus Day off or any of the president’s birthdays off either

[Gwendoline]

Nobody in Europe gets those off either. In Europe there is no Thanksgiving. 4th of July, vetreans day. There's Christmas, new years, Easter, St Patrick's day in Ireland, may day (labour day), all Saints and all Souls day. I think I'm missing a few but like everywhere we starting to see a trend where people are working holidays

[Likes2drive]

Yeah every country is different but only because they don’t have some of the same holidays because of the history of that country, but I only get off major holidays myself here in the USA

[Gwendoline]

Think it works out that most get off the same number of days in each country

[Likes2drive]

It seems to

[Ladsin2]

All the Christian holiday's are stolen from pagans. That said I'm not aware of any serious effort to get rid of Halloween from Christians.

[Paradox316]

Ignorance and superstition and having a stick up their ass.

[Juxtapose]

They are morons who don't understand the first amendment.

[impalabill77]

Because it deal with the undead and the dead. It's a thing they don't appreciate or believe like the catholics. Beliefs of the protestants are different then the catholics.

[Gwendoline]

That's all Souls day. Commemorating of all the Christian Faithful Departed.

[impalabill77]

Halloween is based on a pagan holiday for the dead.

[OtterMan68]

Halloween - All Hallow's Eve is not celebrated as a religious event.

All Saints Day is

[Gwendoline]

Allowtide is 3 days. All hallows Eve is held as a fast day and a vigil and is observed much like how Christmas eve is observed with a vigil

[Anonymous]

Some people don't understand that Christianity is about agency; and want to make everyone their distorted brand of Christianity.

[thenerdone]

I have never heard anyone express a desire to ban Halloween. A lot of people just don't do anything on it.

[Skyros]

It never was a “Christian festival”. It was strictly pagan. YouTube has some great videos explaining it. Just type history of Halloween.

[Gwendoline]

Christian converts celebrated their own festivals and adapted Christianity to suit their cultures. Much like how when the vikings converted they didn't stop being vikings because it was part of their culture

[JoeRob67]

Look at the origins of Halloween. Maybe that is why.

[MisterWack]

They dislike fun / want our kids to suffer

[SugarSugarplum]

It's a pagan festival.

[paledreams]

Wonderful Halloween 🎃

[FreyaRed]

It's not christian it's much older

[slatyb]

They just get off telling other people what to do.

[Alexandrubaschet08]

What is pagan with the Easter and Christmas?

[Anonymous]

God bless our Christian nation

[LiamJHayden]

I would just ignore them.

[beefcakebradybatson]

They're busybodies as always.

[MrGSpotHer]

Yes ban them all