Are you going out
trick-or-treating this year? Are you going to put out a nicely carved pumpkin? More
importantly are you going to feel at all guilty about doing so?
(my pumpkin from two years ago)
October is a strange month.
It marks the beginning of dark, gloomy days and dare I even mention the
‘C’ word, Christmas. It’s not actually
the beginning of Christmas though is it, because Christmas should only be
mentioned in December? October should
solely be about falling leaves and Halloween.
When I was little I never did Halloween. Partly I suspect because I lived on a small
country lane where no one talked to their neighbours but mainly because my mum
didn’t like it. We were allowed to put
out a pumpkin but because no one lived on our lane no on ever saw it. It was pumpkin for our eyes only. I never questioned it until my friend invited
me to a Halloween party. She and most of
my friends were shocked that I had never been trick-or-treating (or trickle
treating as I spent most of childhood believing it to be called).
The reason my mum didn’t like it was because she thought it
was rude and unkind to demand sweets from strangers whilst issuing threats of
turning their houses into a scrambled egg.
Being completely unaware of Halloween traditions I had no idea why I
would ever feel the need to egg someone’s house. I just wanted the sweets! My mum’s other reason was that it was an
American tradition (looking back I don’t think my mum much liked the
Americans. Father Christmas for example
was never Santa because that was what the Americans called him).
I feel now would be a good time, mainly for my own benefit,
to tell you about the origin of Halloween.
According to the well-respected source Wikipedia, Halloween is “the eve
of the Western Christian feast of All Hallows… dedicated to remembering the
dead”. Well that doesn’t seem too
bad. I’m a Christian (as was my mother)
and as a Christian festival I should definitely be able to eat sweets,
right? Wikipedia goes on to say that
trick-or-treating originated from “Souling”, which is the custom of sharing
soul cakes. Children and the poor during
Hallowmas would collect soul cakes ‘as a means of praying for souls in purgatory’. Collecting money or food for the poor seems
like a good idea but that is not what Halloween is today.
I really enjoyed going trick-or-treating with my friends and
I think it can create a lovely community atmosphere. However I do worry about those people who are
forced into taking part, who don’t want to open their doors to strangers and
definitely don’t want their houses egged.
I think the point of Halloween (and a lot of other Christian festivals)
has been lost and the present day traditions are really not very moral (I’m
thinking mainly about the scariness, for the wrong reasons, of provocatively
costumes now). Nevertheless I think I
will always enjoy carving out a pumpkin!
Katie :)
