{"id":3317,"date":"2011-10-20T21:36:16","date_gmt":"2011-10-21T03:36:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=3317"},"modified":"2011-10-20T21:37:04","modified_gmt":"2011-10-21T03:37:04","slug":"does-halloween-fill-a-spiritual-vacuum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=3317","title":{"rendered":"Does Halloween Fill a “Spiritual Vacuum”?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The “Halloween season” keeps starting sooner<\/a>, and its economic impact increases<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Not everyone is pleased. Bloomberg News columnist Amity Shlaes reacts against its “paganism.” <\/a>She is pleased to see the violence of “Mischief Night” fading but continues, ”<\/p>\n

Unmask Halloween, however, and you\u2019ll also find some disconcerting features. Christmas and Easter may be secularized these days, relative to their past, but they remain Christian holidays. People value Halloween, like Valentine\u2019s Day, because they can tell themselves that it\u2019s not merely secularized but actually secular, which is to say, not Christian, Jewish, Hindu or Muslim. . .<\/p>\n

But as much as we\u2019d like it to be, Halloween isn\u2019t secular. It is pagan. There\u2019s nothing else to call a set of ceremonies in which people utter magical phrases, flirt with the night and evoke the dead.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

She appears to think that there is something religious going on here\u2014something outside the traditions of Middle Eastern monotheism\u2014but cannot quite say its name.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The “Halloween season” keeps starting sooner, and its economic impact increases. Not everyone is pleased. Bloomberg News columnist Amity Shlaes reacts against its “paganism.” She is pleased to see the violence of “Mischief Night” fading but continues, ” Unmask Halloween, however, and you\u2019ll also find some disconcerting features. Christmas and Easter may be secularized these […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[10,66],"class_list":["post-3317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-american-religion","tag-halloween"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-Rv","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1243,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1243","url_meta":{"origin":3317,"position":0},"title":"How to Celebrate a Christian Halloween","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 31, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Writing at First Things, an \"interreligious\" journal (\"inter\" as in Catholics and Protestants, maybe), Sally Thomas faces that annual hurdle of the Christian parent: What To Do About Halloween. How can it be fun and still be doctrinally acceptable? She writes,Halloween\u2019s emphasis on darkness makes many Christians squeamish, but, to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Halloween\"","block_context":{"text":"Halloween","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=halloween"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":550,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=550","url_meta":{"origin":3317,"position":1},"title":"Voodoo and Halloween and New\u2026","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 31, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Voodoo and Halloween and New OrleansSome Christian web sites are linking to the ABC news item about Hurricane Katrina allegedly killing the retail voodoo-supply business in New Orleans. Plans for today's celebration continue, however.Some Pagan Witches on the Mississippi Gulf Coast find themselves more accepted after Katrina. Halloween partiers, meanwhile,\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1236,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1236","url_meta":{"origin":3317,"position":2},"title":"Zippy, the Halloween Slug","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 24, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"I have heard of most of these Halloween folk customs.The one with the slug is new to me, though, but maybe someone in the Pacific Northwest could try it and report.Meanwhile, Red Witch in Melbourne is in the midst of a Halloween countdown, examining the commercial side of the holiday\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Australia\"","block_context":{"text":"Australia","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=australia"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11003,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=11003","url_meta":{"origin":3317,"position":3},"title":"Happy Halloween","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 31, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Happy Halloween, dear readers. This day finds me still coping with the 16.5 inches (41 cm) of snow that fell this week, working simultaneously on two journals (a new Pomegranate is coming!) and preparing to start a book-editing project. And my own stuff too, of course. It doesn't feel very\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Halloween\"","block_context":{"text":"Halloween","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=halloween"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/halloween-goth-girl-240x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":543,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=543","url_meta":{"origin":3317,"position":4},"title":"\"Halloween Hoopla\"\"What the f*** happened\u2026","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 26, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"\"Halloween Hoopla\"\"What the f*** happened to Halloween?\" rants Foamy the squirrel. (Link good until Nov. 3; then check the \"Toons\" page.)Tag: Halloween","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1246,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1246","url_meta":{"origin":3317,"position":5},"title":"Organizing Halloween Ritual","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"November 2, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"I said that I was not going to post any more Halloween items. I take that back. Here is one more. One decision we've made is to rebuff curious friends who ask to join our Halloween rituals. It seems like half the people I know want to be pagan on\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Halloween\"","block_context":{"text":"Halloween","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=halloween"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3317"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3317\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3319,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3317\/revisions\/3319"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}