29 October 2009

How do you handle Halloween?

Here's a topic I thought might be good for discussion: If you have (or had) children of the age to trick-or-treat, how do you handle Halloween? Do you allow them to trick-or-treat?

It was never an issue with my older children---we lived in Los Angeles at the time, and for safety reasons I and many parents chose not to participate in trick-or-treating. We attended a very large church that had a huge Harvest party, so the questions never came up.

However, my younger children are now asking why they cannot trick or treat. I feel that as a Christian it is one of those issues of conscience that aren't clearly spelled out in the Bible, and one must decide for oneself, but my concerns with the safety issue remain and I do not feel I can allow them to trick or treat. Unfortunately, Harvest parties do not seem to be very common where we now live and the younger ones are wondering why I don't allow them to trick-or-treat.

So I am curious as to how others handle this. If you are a parent, do you/did you allow your kids to trick-or-treat? Why or why not? If you are not a parent, would you?

My current method of handling it is to buy them candy myself, tell them I don't feel it is safe to go around begging candy from strangers, and hope they let the matter drop. (On a side note, their father is very much against Halloween.)

I would love to read any comments anyone would care to leave, both for and against!!!

3 comments:

  1. My husband hates Halloween. Says it's the devil's holiday. When our children were young, we had the option of taking the children to a havest festival at church. They would dress up in biblical costumes or any other costume that was not a witch or devil, etc. The church stopped doing it a few yesrs ago. Because my children never trick or treated, they don't miss it at all. I don't make a big deal out of it by speaking badly about it because most of our friends participate. Years ago, we read them information on the history of Halloween, and they accepted our decision. Last year our family went to the movie theater, where we saw all the other people of "the club." :) My youngest will probably do that tonight with a friend. I'm sure you've already made your decision by now. Hope you feel comfortable about it. Because this is such a controversial subject, I will sign as anonymous. Don't feel like reading any "you're a bad mommy mail." :) I will write back if I find a children's book that I have on the subject.

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  2. A book that we read to the kids is "Mommy, Why Don't We Celebrate Halloween?" by Linda Hacon Winwood. Google it, or go to Amazon.com. Best wishes.

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  3. I know Christians who celebrate it and those who don't. I think it's one of those issues of conscience that you must decide for yourself. I am not certain if I could do it in good conscience, but the safety issue really does concern me. This year at least, they are having candy I bought for them myself and we are trying out a few new fall pie recipes so they won't be deprived. I guess it will be a little easier this year since it's on a Saturday and we go to church on Saturday evening.

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