Ghosts and Goblins: One Thing We Can Agree On
Today marks the start of Allhallowtide, a three-day feast, celebrated by both Catholic and Protestant Christians. It encompasses All Hallows Eve (Halloween), All Hallows (or Saints) Day, and All Souls Day. Allhallowtide is a time to remember martyrs, saints, the faithful departed, and in general, the dead. Most people–Christian, or otherwise–don’t tend to mark these days as particularly sacred or holy and many Christians see Halloween as another battle in the culture wars. If you’re like me (and Nate Bargatze) and grew up with “80s and 90s Christian parents,” you probably have a lot of mixed feelings about Halloween and this season’s focus on death. Harvest Festivals, anyone?
But as an adult, and especially as one who has experienced loss, I actually look forward to Allhallowtide. I like dressing up my kids, but mostly I like the common ground with my neighbors that Halloween offers, and the generosity that comes with it. Beyond neighborliness, Halloween and Allhallowtide, are a way for people of faith–Christians in particular–to find common ground with people of other or no faith. According to a 2023 Gallup poll, 69% of Americans believe in angels and 67% believe in heaven. Allhallowtide can cut across cultures, uniting disparate people of different types of Christian faith, despite political or social differences. For me, it’s become a mini Eastertide, a chance to reflect on and celebrate that, as my Greek Orthodox brothers and sisters would say, “Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and on those in the tombs bestowing life!”
Church in Sweden on the feast of Allhallows, with commemorations to lost loved ones. Image provided by David Castor.
What I especially like about that declaration, is that Christianity allows room for the truly horrific. Christians believe in a God that loves to transform suffering into joy, darkness into light. Christians believe some wild stuff: the world is fallen and full of sin and death, human beings have the capacity for great good and also great evil, things were so bad that God had to become embodied and suffer all the regular horrors and indignity of being a human (puberty, amirite?) and on top of that, die an excruciatingly horrific and disgusting death. Then that God-man comes back to life, totally tangible, but also able to walk through walls. After 40 days, that God-man ascends into heaven and then sends his Spirit to come and live inside all the people who believe in him. One day, this immortal God-man is going to return and all the people who have died in the hope of the resurrection, will rise from their graves and live forever.
Oh and as I write this, there is an unseen battle raging between good and evil. And even though we believe that evil loses in the end, death–our last enemy– is still allowed to come and devour the people we love the most.
Honestly, that’s a much more interesting take, for people both inside and outside the faith, than Harvest Festivals. And it’s a story that is being told through the medium of horror in shows, like Evil, Midnight Mass, and movies like The Exorcist and The Rite.
Before I go further, I want to say that this is not a blanket endorsement of horror as a genre. There are a lot of people, Christian and non-Christian who just don’t want to go there. And that’s totally fine.
But if you’re curious, let me make the case for the use of horror in storytelling. Especially about faith.
First, horror is a way to talk about the battle between good and evil common to many faiths. In Evil, a group of assessors hired by the Catholic church spend each episode investigating unexplainable phenomena. The group is made up of David, a priest, Kristen, an agnostic psychologist, and Ben, a former Muslim/now atheist and skeptic, who looks for physical or scientific explanations for whatever case they’re working on. Evil explores the fine line between the supernatural, the psychological, and the physical. It features traditional horror staples, like demons, but it also incorporates Muslim beliefs about the supernatural and exorcisms. The show examines the way in which evil could manifest itself in a modern culture, through technology, scientific advancements, and systemic injustice. Evil explores temptation, the way sin is always crouching at our proverbial doors, and the faith it takes to resist it. Evil is depicted as genuinely scary, but ultimately defeatable, a message that is embraced by many faiths beyond Christianity.
The Exorcist, is a story about a priest overcoming his crisis of faith and sacrificing himself to save a little girl. Mike Flanagan’s Midnight Mass features people of different faiths and people without faith, sacrificing themselves to defeat the evil taking over their neighbors and friends.
Secondly, it’s a way to talk about the real horrors of the world from which those of us blessed and privileged to live in a relatively safe, healthy, and prosperous country are largely protected. Jordan Peele’s Get Out and Us examine the power of racism in America. Likewise, twenty-first century America doesn’t have structures and rituals for grief anymore. A lot of people are uncomfortable with displays of mourning and the complexity of grief, because it’s not a daily reality. Part of grief is reckoning with the horror of what death and dying do to the bodies and minds of the people we love. It is unspeakable. Horror is a way to tell that story in all of its facets. The Haunting of Hill House–often described as This is Us, but with ghosts–is as much about jump scares as it is about a family’s inability to cope with the immensity of grief.
Finally, horror is a way to portray faith and people of faith in a way that makes them understandable. Evil’s Sister Andrea is a nun who can interact with demons. She is tough and empowered and loves Jesus. As a nun, she’s tasked with the daily drudgery of maintaining the church and the rectory, but is the most spiritually attuned character because she prays while she works. David, an extremely attractive priest, is drawn to his colleague, Kristen. His journey to resist temptation is portrayed as noble because he won’t break his vows to God. In Midnight Mass, Monsignor Pruit, the deceived priest, and the parishioners on Crockett Island are depicted with empathy so it is easy to see how a desire for a redemption and eternal life could lead to dangerous and deadly ideas. At a time when people tend to be less religious, horror is one of the few avenues for dialogue between those of faith and those outside it. It’s a way to connect with Gen Z–the least religious generation to date. In the UK, according to the think tank Theos, 42% of Gen Z respondents believed in the supernatural.
For Christians, embracing the horror, degradation, dehumanization, the “godlessness,” as Fleming Rutledge writes, of the cross, might be a way to connect with a generation that is also “godless.” Horror could be a way to tell the story of Jesus, described in the book of Isaiah, as “like one whom people hide their faces.” By facing the complexity and horror of death head on, we can also celebrate the joy and transcendence of its defeat.
Image provided by Pexels
As you pass by the spectacle of Halloween decorations and see depictions of Dia de los Muertos and other Allhallowtide celebrations, consider how these days allow for connection both with those who have passed on and those who are still living, just next door to us.