Prof. Boerner's Explorations

    
Commentary:

Halloween is closely associated with the Catholic Church’s celebration of All Saints’ Day. It was evolved from a variety of pagan celebrations, especially as practiced by the Celts in Ireland. In the new world, it morphed into the celebration of the Day of the Dead. This latter celebration is related to All Souls Day, the first day in November; it celebrates those who have died and are living in a undefined state in the after life. In the United States, this religious observance has become the secular celebration of Halloween, which reflects a commercialization of this holiday.

More than other aspects of Halloween, All Saints’ Day is celebrated differently by the Western churches and the Eastern Orthodox churches. By and large, the eastern observations have maintained a closer observance to the religious traditions than in the western cultures. Read more about these differences in body of this posting.

So, let’s get into an exploration of All Saints’ Day. As you read the following material, think about both the religious and secular observances to draw you own conclusions about these celebrations… GLB

These Introductory Comments are copyrighted:
Copyright©2011 — Gerald Boerner — All Rights Reserved

[ 1918 Words ]
    

    
Commentary:

Halloween is a big time for kids. They dress up in costumes ranging from ghouls, ghosts, goblins, and other other-worldly creatures to popular movie characters to Disney characters. And, of course, pirates are an old tradition in this country. The long tradition is for kids to go from door-to-door around their neighborhoods, ringing doorbells, and shouting “trick-or-treat”. In most cases, the only consequence is the distribution of candy and other sweet confections. Seldom does the homeowner require his little visitors to perform a trick!

Even back in my youth, kids quickly learned where the best treats were to be collected. But few kids strayed outside our own neighborhood. Today, unfortunately, we find that groups of kids are driven into the better neighborhoods from outside the area to collect their goodies. This has led to many couples, especially older couples without children at home to leave their lights off, indicating that that house is not giving out “goodies”.

Pranks have been a long time tradition of this holiday. Some of us even have taken to storing out automobiles in garages or behind fences to discourage vandalism. Of course, the standard prank of teenagers is to “paper” the houses of friends or enemies, creating quite a cleanup task for the homeowner. On the whole, however, the pranks are much less severe and don’t lead to either property damage or personal injury. But parents must maintain close supervision of their brood so they will exhibit good behavior while trick-or-treating and restrict the consumption of the sweets collected.

So, let’s start our exploration of the tradition of trick-or-treating, its origins, and how it is practiced in various areas of the U.S. and western Europe… GLB

These Introductory Comments are copyrighted:
Copyright©2011 — Gerald Boerner — All Rights Reserved

[ 1885 Words ]