A prayer request for Halloween

Thanks for the request. It was well thought out and written beautifully. I was baptised at the age of 4 and since then have never been allowed to celebrate Halloween. As an adult I dressed up twice, both times for a party and couldn\'t help feeling guilty after, although I really don\'t think in my heart I was doing anything wrong. I just don\'t like the idea of encouraging the \"holiday\". Luckily this year it falls on a Wednesday, the same day I have a Bible study class.

We don\'t celebrate halloween any longer. I did as a kid and it was one of my favorite holidays but then my parents learned more about the Faith and we stopped. My kids don\'t celebrate it at all. FYI: I did hear that jack o\' lanterns where pagan. I heard that on Halloween no one was allowed to light their hearth. Then at nightfall they went to do their rituals which included a human sacrifice. Afterwards they would all take a light from that fire and put it in a pumpkin which was carved to \"look\" like someone they knew that was dead, and taken home to light their hearth. This supposedly made the person (who they carved) present in their homes that night. Someone who is very read told me this, but I personally have never read it for myself. Just thought I\'d share... :)

I\'ll pray for you guys. My family has never celebrated Halloween. We always turned off all the lights in our house and watched a movie together. I get asked all the time why we don\'t and I have to explain that my family is Christian and we don\'t want to celebrate pagan holidays.

so... any survivors?

Two articles about Halloween I liked: http://www.allsaintsofamerica.org/orthodoxy/halloween.html http://www.orthodoxinfo.com/praxis/halloween.aspx

We celebrate Halloween. The kids do not dress up as anything scary, nor do they want to. They disapproved of the neighbor girl who dressed up as the devil. My kids and I used it as an opportunity to meet the neighbors. One friend of our, who has now moved, made Halloween into a evening of hospitality. She made a picnic table full of treats, set up the fire pit, and invited everyone around--or passed by. Many of her neighbors currently lived in broken homes, with family members in jail and a lot of poverty. She made Halloween into an evening of hospitality and charity--doing what Christ commanded us to do every day.

We celebrate Halloween. I used to go Trick-Or-Treating with our Father & Matushka\'s daughter when we were little. So, I never really knew it was \"wrong\".