Recently the month of October gave way to the month of November and with it came three special days: Halloween, All Saints Day and All Souls Day. A non-Catholic friend of mine asked me what is the difference between these days. It was difficult for me to give an answer that I felt was accurate. So I did some research.
All Saints’ Day, officially known as the Solemnity of All Saints, is celebrated on the 1st of November in honour of all the saints, as the name suggests. In Christianity, saints have feast days, commemorating the anniversary of that saint’s martyrdom. Eventually, there came a time when the number of martyrdoms became so numerous that it was impossible to have a feast day for every saint. Hence, All Saints’ Day came about; to equally venerate all these saints.
This day was also known as the Feast of All Hallows. The day before 1st November, 31st October, was known as All Hallow’s Eve or All Hallow’s Even. This evolved into the word we know today as Halloween. It has its roots in a festival of the dead, hailing from old Celtic traditions. Its associations with the occult stem from this tradition, although the eventual evolution of the festival to what we know today came in the later part of the 20th century, in an effort to sanitise and commercialise the ‘pagan’ festival. There are little or no Christian links with Halloween, except perhaps, for the origins of the name.
All Souls’ Day is on the 2nd of November and is a day to commemorate the dead who have not yet entered Heaven. It is a day to remember the souls who are undergoing temporal punishment for their sins in Purgatory. This is how it is differentiated from All Saints’ Day. For many cultures, there is a special day in a year for the commemoration of their dead. In the Chinese culture, it is the Qing Ming Festival. For Chinese Catholics, All Souls’ Day has become its equivalent and is just as important to them.
As Catholics, we believe in the afterlife with God in Heaven but we also believe that we cannot go there immediately because we are sinners. Therefore, we remember and pray for the souls of those we love that they can be cleansed and enter into the Heavenly light.
All three days have their differences and their own special rituals and commemorations. They are common in their links to the dead and a celebration and honouring of the spiritual world and the afterlife. They are evolutions from the very old traditions of the festivals of the dead and of the hope of renewal and new life.
Written by: Irene
Sources:
New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia, All Saints Day: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01315a.htm
New Advent Cathlic Encylopedia, All Souls’ Day: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01315b.htm
Wikipedia, Halloween: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween
