It should be now “Holyween’ not “Halloween’,
this is what the Christians Communities, years now, in parishes and schools try
to give as correction to this ancient Celtic festival of Samhain, and now American
and English tradition of the ‘scaring evening’.
Though the word HALLOWEEN finds
its origin in the eighteenth century’s Christian tradition, "holy
evening" or "hallowed evening", the evening before the ‘All Hallows’
day’, it has lost it meaning to become the representation of evil faces. Many are
the countries where, on the evening before the All Saints’ Day, people wear
masks or any other kind of make-up to appear the scariest. It is, a TRICK-OR-TREAT
that’s all one could say of it. It has nothing of holiness.
Calling to memory our common
vacation to holiness and based on the beautiful sermon of St. Bernard of
Clairvaux saying, that “Today we celebrate the feast of all the unknown saints
who are now in heaven. The Church reminds us that sanctity is within everyone's
reach. Through the communion of saints, we help one another achieve sanctity.
In the early days, the Christians were accustomed to solemnize the anniversary
of a martyr's death for Christ at the place of martyrdom. In the fourth
century, neighboring dioceses began to interchange feasts, to transfer relics,
to divide them, and to join in a common feast.” The Saint Luigi Orione Seminary
together with the Novitiate and the Aspirants of the Little Missionary Sisters
of Charity thought of the “Holyween” Costume. Seminarians and religious were
invited to portray a saint who inspires them or to make a creativity of a religious
figure.
As simple this could sound, the ‘Holyween’ day
in the seminary was a nice correction for the modern ‘Halloween’ or the scary
night. We can all be proud and say, we made it, because we hope one day, to be
among the Saints.
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