Written A Year Apart. What looks to me like growth.

A blog in two parts.

Part 1. (Written Fall 2013)

Let’s talk about Halloween, because I’m annoyed by the phrase “I don’t celebrate/do Halloween, I’m Christian”. And it’s only been this year (last year) that I have actually taken notice of this, though I’m sure that I have been exposed to this phrase or some variation of it before. It could be that now I have a job that is big into Halloween, or that I am listening better, or something else that I haven’t thought of.

I’ve never understood why there are certain things that some (not all) Christians abstain from where as other embrace those same things. Now I say abstain, and it could be assumed that I am talking about sex, alcohol, and specific foods, because that makes sense with biblical law. What I’m talking about in some ways is Christian parents pushing their personal brand of beliefs onto their children. This once again brings me back to Halloween, (or for another example I’ve experienced, modern rock music, regardless of whether or not it is a Christian musician/group or not) because though it does derive it’s origin from the belief that it was the one day of the year that the spirits of the dead return to the mortal realm, or something else ridiculous like that. But now it’s origin, though not forgotten, no stock is put in it, or at least not in common place, and yet there are those who question Halloween and stick to thinking that it was inherently bad and thus forcing this belief on their children being excluded from the average practices surrounding Halloween. The days has now been reclaimed by Western Society as a reason to put on costumes, get or give out candy or even just be someone else for a few hours.

Now if this was a universal practice among Christians I don’t think I would find this to be so irritating. But the disdain for Halloween is only a personal choice or at least that’s what I’ve always thought, seen, and believed. I’ve known pastors who dress up for Halloween, and members of their congregation refuse to even consider that western society’s reclamation removed the paganism from the thing.

Part 2. (Written Fall 2014)

Rereading to the point above I am realizing that almost around a year after writing it what I am doing is bashing how people have taken to making their beliefs their own. I am not saying that I understand why they don’t celebrate it I am saying that I am not angry about it anymore, and that I understand where the lack of uniformity is coming from. Because they’re just doing what I’m doing, in that I myself am making my beliefs my own, and I think more people need to do that, or take a critical look at what they believe including the “rules” that are imposed by their beliefs’ central supposed authority or text.

My only issue now is one that I touched on in part 1 and that is if their beliefs are dictated by what their parents believe and thus just what they did while growing up. Because blindly following your parents’ beliefs are still not making them your own. Blind belief is not a good thing; logically you should know what you believe and why you believe it. Now this might seem like it contradicts the commonly quoted Bible verse “walk by faith, not by sight”, but it is my opinion that belief and faith are two different things. Belief is “an acceptance that a statement is true or that something exists”, whereas Faith is “belief that is not based on proof”. So the way I see it the verse is closely related to the Switchfoot lyric “Doubt your doubts, and believe your beliefs”.

And that could be the overall message behind this post, or at least one of them. One of the others is being related to learning about your beliefs and not just going with whatever your parents tell you to.

So this was a post written in two parts a year apart from each other. Starting out as a rant about people not celebrating Halloween, and it turned into me going on about how people should not blindly believe things and how people should make their beliefs their own.

Post Script: As always there is probably more that I could add, and more to learn to add, if I come across it I will share it maybe by a new post or by updating this one. Either way if there is more for me to share I will share it. Also I hope that I will have other posts written before this one besides my one on feminism because I am scheduling this one for the week of Halloween.