Mumbai: A senior Catholic priest has asked churchgoers and gymkhanas to avoid Halloween celebrations on October 31, saying that the festival glorifies darkness, fear, and the occult and is, therefore, incompatible with their faith.
About Halloween
Halloween, or ‘All Hallows’ Eve,’ is celebrated on the evening before All Hallows’ Day or All Saints’ Day on November 1. While ‘All Saints Day’ is part of the religious calendar, Halloween is not. Father Daniel Fernandes, associate pastor, Infant Jesus Church, Jogeshwari, said that the costumes, symbols, and practices of Halloween often mock the sacred and normalise what is sinful. Fernandes said that it was painful to see gymkhanas, institutions, and social clubs accepting and even promoting Halloween.
According to Fernandes, the themes of Halloween – ghosts, tombs, haunted spirits – represent a fascination with death completely dissociated from the redemptive light of Christ. The Ouija boards, spirit summoning, mock rituals, and chants have occult undertones, said Fernandes, who compared it to witchcraft.
Dressing up as witches, ghosts, demons, or monsters blur the lines between light and darkness, said Fernandes who quoted scriptures that warned against the practice of sorcery, divination, or necromancy or communicating with the dead. “Let us also recognise the tragic irony of the so-called ‘trick or treat.’ It is, in a deeper sense, the devil’s own mockery – tricking Christians into thinking they are participating in harmless revelry while he ‘treats’ himself to their distracted souls.
The Catholic Gymkhana used to host such events eight to ten years ago, but stopped after some members expressed religious concerns. “We thought that Catholics arriving as vampires dripping blood does not align with religious beliefs,” said Ian Pereira, a member. Instead, the gymkhana will hold an ‘angel’s night’ on November 1. Fernandes said that allowing children to dress as ghosts or demons, to speak of spells and haunted houses, trivialises the spiritual battle between good and evil.
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