Days are getting ever shorter and colder, the sun, even at midday, is lower in the sky. (This Sunday is the end of Daylight Saving Time!) Tatters of cold mist hang on leafless branches of bushes and trees. There is still no snow to brighten the days and nights, the land is wet, cold, dark and brown, and nature is shutting down in preparation for her winter sleep. This is the season to remember our dead with respect and thankfulness.
In my native land this is the season to visit family graves. People decorate graves with mums and other hardy autumn flowers, and also with bright fragile straw-like immortelles. And of course candles and oil lamps are lighted and kept shining for at least two days. In this autumn season cemeteries and kirkyards of Central Europe, which had been dark up until then, suddenly burst out with lights and look almost like another city illuminated with hundreds of flickering flames.
Decorating graves and lighting candles are ancient customs of the Feasts of All Saints and Souls. They predate Christianity and harken back to ancient Celtic roots of my native land. Celtic people called this holiday Samhain and perhaps more than any other holy day it was a liminal season, a time when the boundary between our world and the other was thinner and could be crossed, especially from the other side. Thus besides fires and lights lit for those who had passed away, Celts used to keep an extra place at the dinner table or by the family hearth for those who departed and should they come for a visit, they were to be treated with kindness and respect.
Only bad, guilty and disrespectful people were to be afraid of their departed ancestors and family members. All other awaited this season perhaps with some trepidation but also with excitement. These are the deepest and also more genuine and spiritual origins of our commercialized and secularized Trick-or-treating and other Halloween customs. Now think, what does it say about our culture if frightening each other and fear of ghosts (be it playful and teasing), so completely underline our modern celebrations! Does it mean that we feel guilty because of our disrespect towards our ancestors?
Of course, many can claim that all this is shallow and foreign to the core of our Judeo-Christian faith. But surprisingly, the Hebrew Bible also knows ancestral spirits, albeit their presence is predominantly hidden, suppressed and largely neglected. On this All Saints Day we will search for the biblical healing ghosts and hear the prophetic promise of their resurrection. Come to remember and celebrate our departed and be healed.
In my native land this is the season to visit family graves. People decorate graves with mums and other hardy autumn flowers, and also with bright fragile straw-like immortelles. And of course candles and oil lamps are lighted and kept shining for at least two days. In this autumn season cemeteries and kirkyards of Central Europe, which had been dark up until then, suddenly burst out with lights and look almost like another city illuminated with hundreds of flickering flames.
Decorating graves and lighting candles are ancient customs of the Feasts of All Saints and Souls. They predate Christianity and harken back to ancient Celtic roots of my native land. Celtic people called this holiday Samhain and perhaps more than any other holy day it was a liminal season, a time when the boundary between our world and the other was thinner and could be crossed, especially from the other side. Thus besides fires and lights lit for those who had passed away, Celts used to keep an extra place at the dinner table or by the family hearth for those who departed and should they come for a visit, they were to be treated with kindness and respect.
Only bad, guilty and disrespectful people were to be afraid of their departed ancestors and family members. All other awaited this season perhaps with some trepidation but also with excitement. These are the deepest and also more genuine and spiritual origins of our commercialized and secularized Trick-or-treating and other Halloween customs. Now think, what does it say about our culture if frightening each other and fear of ghosts (be it playful and teasing), so completely underline our modern celebrations! Does it mean that we feel guilty because of our disrespect towards our ancestors?
Of course, many can claim that all this is shallow and foreign to the core of our Judeo-Christian faith. But surprisingly, the Hebrew Bible also knows ancestral spirits, albeit their presence is predominantly hidden, suppressed and largely neglected. On this All Saints Day we will search for the biblical healing ghosts and hear the prophetic promise of their resurrection. Come to remember and celebrate our departed and be healed.
