Christianity and Other Ancient Religions by Stephen J. Bedard

The Christian Debate Over Halloween

October 30, 2011 3:12 AM
Jim Roope

For many American Christians, Halloween is innocent, harmless and fun, and they trick-or-treat, carve pumpkins and don costumes with gusto.

For others, though - especially for some conservative and fundamentalist Christians - Halloween is a celebration of evil and has no place in the life of a believer.

"We don't endorse that or we don't celebrate that," said Joe Hernandez, pastor of Worshipwalk Church in Los Angeles, which belongs to the conservative Pentecostal tradition. "People are celebrating the devil's holiday."

Halloween's roots are believed to date back 1,400 years, to the Irish-pagan New Year's celebration. The Celtic New Year began on November 1. People would light bonfires and wear costumes to ward off roaming ghosts and evil spirits.

Some Christians, like Hernandez, believe Halloween's pagan roots can open the door to evil. That's why Worshipwalk is hosting a harvest festival in its church parking lot on Monday, with kids' games and face painting.

Hernandez calls it harvesting hearts for God.

Some conservative churches go a step further, attempting to co-opt the holiday with haunted houses - called "hell houses" - that are designed to give a glimpse of eternal damnation in hopes of strengthening faith.

"There's Satan's lies and there's Jesus' redemption and there's a message that will change your life," said Keenan Roberts, who says he is the inventor of the hell house, which people walk or call through, just as they would a haunted house.

"It's designed to reach the 'sight and sound' age," said Roberts. "The message is sacred but the method is not."

Hell houses can be graphic. In Roberts' hell house - which he markets through his Hell House Ministries - live actors depict scenes of abortion, rape, suicide and murder, though the journey through the house culminates in scenes of redemption through Jesus.

Pastor of the fundamentalist New Destiny church near Denver, Colorado, Roberts said that his ministry has received a lot of criticism for what critics say is "going too far."

But he said today's kids are so desensitized that he will do whatever it takes to get the message of salvation to take root.

PCUSA on the wrong side of God's history

Those who support gay marriage say that those of us who oppose it, are on the wrong side of history. When I am told that, I always ask, what side of history? Well, there's a history ran by the prince of this world, aka The Devil, and the history set by the Lord God. One allows humans, or gives the impression that humans can set out their own future, be that of destruction, or of the supposed "freedom" they have obtained by the development of culture or technology.

One example of this is how the PCUSA has turned from biblical teaching about sexuality, to a conforming stand with the culture that surrounds it.

MILWAUKEE — A Wisconsin man who left his Presbyterian ministry in California more than 20 years ago after telling his congregation that he is gay was welcomed back into the church leadership on Saturday as its first openly gay ordained minister.

In a quavering voice ripe with emotion, 56-year-old Scott Anderson told the hundreds of friends and backers who packed Covenant Presbyterian Church in Madison for his ordination ceremony that he never thought the day would come.

At least I can see that he was truthful at the beginning, resigning after he came out of the closet.

But what is worst for me, is to see how those who claim to be christians, can be so energetic at celebrating sin, yet, so "modest" in their worship to God.

When he was presented to the crowd, audience members gave him a thunderous standing ovation and began roaring with cheers.“That was very atypical of Presbyterians,” Doug Poland, an elder at Covenant Presbyterian Church, told the Wisconsin State Journal. “Usually our hands are in our laps.”

Unbelievable. These people not only give sin an standing ovation, but roar and cheer for what God clearly stands against. These people are not Christians, but pagans who call themselves christians.

But to really show how culture changes "christian"people, and commit to culture rather than to Scripture,  the piece gives us an example of someone who was biblical, but was turned due to some of his friends being gay.

Anderson chose the Rev. Mark Achtemeier of Dubuque, Iowa, to deliver the sermon Saturday. Achtemeier used to be one of the most vocal opponents of gay ordination, but he announced a complete turnaround after friendships with gay Christians prompted him to re-evaluate scriptural teachings about homosexuality.

Let me ask this man, if he remembers what Deuteronomy says about being enticed by others to do what God has not commanded:

Deuteronomy 13:6-9
New International Version (NIV)
 ⁶ If your very own brother, or your son or daughter, or the wife you love, or your closest friend secretly entices you, saying, “Let us go and worship other gods” (gods that neither you nor your ancestors have known, ⁷ gods of the peoples around you, whether near or far, from one end of the land to the other), ⁸ do not yield to them or listen to them. Show them no pity. Do not spare them or shield them. ⁹ You must certainly put them to death. Your hand must be the first in putting them to death, and then the hands of all the people.

Of course, we don't kill people under the New Covenant, but the principle remains, one must not be swayed by anyone to go against the revelation of the Lord.

So, keep changing your mind just to supposedly affirm others. This is not showing God's love, rather, showing contempt for people's eternal destiny.

PCUSA may be right on the side of human history, but not in God's history.

Luis A. Jovel 

Europe is not only becoming unchristian, but is going pagan

What happens to a nation when they forsake God? They turn to any other type of belief, of course. Estonia and the Czech are prime examples of this trend, but are not alone in this. There are many countries that are going that guy. Australia is an example of it, even though we may have mega churches like Hill Song, that gives a false impression that the gospel is well and vibrant here. Talking to a Pentecostal pastor today, I was told that once you leave the centres of the cities, Pentecostal churches struggle to survive.

Another thing that worries me, is that those countries that embraced the Protestant Reformation, are also as enthusiastic to disowned it. Take this as an example. In a documentary about the Christian Church on the History Channel presented by Diarmaid McCulloch "A History of Christianity", when the female pastor of Geneve is asked what she thinks about how John Calvin would feel to know that a woman pastor is the one heading his congregation, her answer was "well, that was his time, now this is my time".

Now Geneva is far from the propaganda that John Knox spread during his time, that Calvin's Geneva was "the most perfect school of Christ". The reality is that it never was the most perfect school of Christ. Even when Jesus was with his disciples, and believe me, that was the most perfect school led by the real founder of our faith, they had issues among them. The sad thing of it all, is that Lutheran and Reformed countries never achieved the Reformation they sought, and due to the laziness imbedded in their own traditions-no works, even though after you are saved although you are called to do them but be careful not to over do them just in case you believe that you are doing works to be saved, therefore, don't do anything- has paid out at the end.

Well, you can read the news article, and be informed.

Estonia's capital Tallinn. A 2005 poll found that only 16% of Estonians believed in God. Photograph: Ilja Dubovskis/Alamy

Estonia and the Czech Republic are the two nations that often claim to be the least religious in Europe. And they seem to be proud of their unbelief. According to the census of 2000, 29% of the total population considered themselves as adherents of some religion. Almost 14% of them were Lutherans (in the 1930s the percentage of Lutherans was over 80), and about 13% Orthodox Christians divided between two churches: one under the canonical jurisdiction of ecumenical patriarchate and the other under the jurisdiction of Moscow patriarchate.

A Eurobarometer poll in 2005 found that only 16% of the Estonian population believed in God. With this number, Estonia hit the bottom of the list. However, at the same time more than half the population (54%) believed in some sort of spirit or life force. Thus it could be claimed that 70% of the Estonian population are believers, at least in some sense of the word. Professor Grace Davie's description of the British religiosity as"believing without belonging" seems to fit to the Estonian context as well.

The churches are on Sundays mostly empty and the ignorance of religion is widespread. According to the available statistics and surveys, the membership of religious associations in Estonia remains under one fifth of the total population.

Non-Estonians (mainly immigrants of Russian stock) are considerably more religious, and this becomes even more evident among the younger generations. Surveys show that young Estonians in general have become estranged from every form of religion that could be considered as traditional or as religion at all.

For this situation there are several reasons, starting from the distant past (the close connection of the churches with the Swedish or German ruling classes) up to the Soviet-period atheist policy when the chain of religious traditions was broken in most families.

In Estonia religion has never played an important role on the political or ideological battlefield. The institutional religious life was dominated by foreigners until the early 20th century. The tendencies that prevailed in the late 1930s for closer relations between the state and Lutheran church were ended with the Soviet occupation in 1940. While the Roman Catholic church maintained its dissident role in the Soviet countries, the Lutheran church was not successful in this. This might to have to do something with the Lutheran tradition in general as the role of the Lutheran church also in East Germany diminished considerably during the GDR days.

Although there were some clergymen associated with the dissident movement, the churches remained within the limits set for them by the Soviet authorities. The national reawakening in the late 1980s was accompanied with the religious revival. Religion was something that was seen as a connection with the pre-Soviet golden days. However, by the early 1990s the interest in institutionalised religion started to diminish. Currently the Lutheran church, still considered as the most traditional religious institution in Estonia, has fewer members than it had in the first half of the 1980s when the dues-paying membership reached its Soviet nadir.

The big question for the next decades concerning the religious situation in Estonia is what is going to be the future of the Lutheran church? Although it has been the dominant church among Estonians since the Reformation, the vast majority of younger generations have been estranged from it and the membership numbers are declining.

A new phenomenon during the last 15 years has been the rising number of Estonians identifying themselves with a nature-spirituality that could be defined as the Estonian neo-paganism. However, exactly what this is is much more difficult to explain, as it stresses individualism in religious matters. Although the organisation of the neo-pagans claim to represent pre-Christian religious tradition that has been passed from generation to generation through centuries, and dislikes the term neo-pagan, the historical facts do not support its arguments.

Estonian neo-paganism is closely associated with reverence to nature as well as reviving and following the centuries-old folk traditions, such as the lighting of bonfires during the summer solstice.

Reverence for nature and vocal protection of historical sacred groves has given a positive image to the movement and to their religion, known also as the Earth religion. On the other hand, there are not many neo-pagans officially affiliated with the organisation itself, and during the ancient holy days the groves are not filled with people. The claims by the organisation that all of that 54% who said they believed in spirit or life force are followers of old Estonian religious traditions is pure wishful thinking.