Happy Halloween...So, Do You Want to Hear Something Really Scary?

Ever heard of an exorcism?  Of course, everyone has.  But have you ever seen one?  I've never met someone who had been around something like this, and the practice of exorcism is quite suspicious to me, but there are people who will tell you that it's real and that they've seen some frightening things while witnessing such events.

Well, you no longer have to take their word for it.  Corgitz.com has brought a list of exorcism discussions and recordings for the curious.  Check out the exorcism page here, then scroll down to the bottom of the post, past the videos, and click on the Russian exorcism recording.  And wait.

Happy Halloween!

Are Christians Still Afraid of Halloween?

I've never been to a church that didn't celebrate Halloween in some way.  Bear in mind, I'm a Southern Baptist, and we are the group that everyone thinks protests things like Halloween.  (We don't, but everyone thinks we do because of a few independent churches who call themselves "Baptists" and make us all look like morons.  But I digress.)

It's well understood that Halloween is a game, and that there's no harm in dressing up as a robot (as I once did as a child) or a fairy (my wife's costume of choice) and goofing around.  In fact, I would have to look long and hard to find a Church that actually had a problem with that sort of thing.  However, the internet has brought these people closer to us.  (Thanks, internet.)

Over at ChristianAnswers.com, we are given the following head-scratcher concerning Halloween:

My family does not celebrate it or participate in it. We do not believe that our children are “missing out,” and neither do they. Other days are used for costumes and parties.

Eh?  It's OK to do Halloween things on any day other than October 31st?  That doesn't make any sense.  The article never gives a reason why someone should abstain from these things from Halloween, but the writer is certainly very proud to be doing so.  The only explanation given goes as follows:

The October 31st holiday that we today know as Halloween has strong roots in paganism and is closely connected with worship of the Enemy of this world, Satan. It is a holiday that generally glorifies the dark things of this world, rather than the light of Jesus Christ, The Truth.

I'm not sure where they studied history, but Halloween has a long and complicated history that changes with each culture.  Throughout these changes, it has never actually been associated with worshiping the Devil.  (In fact, Devil worship is an incredibly rare belief system that one is hard pressed to find before the 20th century.  More on this in a future post.)  Someone needs to tell the folks over at ChristianAnswers.com that you can't cite historical facts like that without quoting a source of some sort.

The Jeremiah Project (I have never heard of them) gives us a lengthy post about the history of Halloween that simply can't get over the fact that Halloween customs are "borrowed from Pagan practices."  This is another historical fallacy that many amateur Christian writers make - the appeal to Paganism.  In antiquity, the Romans labeled non-Christians as Pagans.  It referred to the varied pantheistic and polytheistic views of these people who were not monotheists, and these groups had many different religions amongst them.  A "pagan" may have worshiped at the temple of Isis or to a few of the Norse Gods.  There were different traditions amongst the Pagans and absolutely no solidarity within their ranks.  As such, there's no such thing as Pagan religion or Pagan rituals.  Those are just weasel words used by writers with no historical training.  (A historian who talks about such things will actually name the specific religion and it's ceremonies.)

The same fallacy is used over at DemonBuster.com (I don't make these names up), except this time it's the Druids who are to blame.  As I've said in the past, absolutely nothing is known about the Druids.  All of their records were destroyed by the Romans and almost no mention of them exists in history.  If they had a religion, it is long dead and no one has known its details for a very long time.  Unless the minds behind DemonBusters.com have unearthed some new historical documents and translated them from the Celtic languages of antiquity then we can safely say that this argument is invalid.

GreaterThings.com tells us to have costume parties on some other day, with no explanation as to why these things are OK every other day of the year.  Logical fallacies are abounding.  I can only assume that these people actually think that October 31 is a magical date when demons have access to our world and are made more powerful by the sight of children wearing Transformers costumes.  That is not how Halloween was ever portrayed in history, and that sort of demonic mysticism is not supported by Biblical passages or any occult practices.  That's not how it works in anyone's religion.

I can tell that someone's not a real historian when their ideas could have been inspired by Buffy marathons.

But, remember, that's just the internet.  In the real world, Christians are celebrating Halloween just like everyone else; many churches even set up booths in their parking lots just to give candy out to local trick-or-treaters.  There's nothing wrong with having fun on Halloween, and decent churches know that.

Christmas Decorations in Stores Too Early - Why Does This Bother People

When I was a kid I noticed that in Late August/Early September stores would stock Christmas items on their shelves.  The first time I noticed this I was at Wal-Mart with my dad and I asked him why this stuff was out so early.  He told me, quite simply, that people were already ready to buy it to be ready for the holidays.  I shrugged.  That seemed normal to me.

Little did I know that the majority of my peers would react differently, and I've learned that reading about poverty and social injustice doesn't affect people nearly as strongly as the sight of a Santa Claus decoration in September.  The emotional free-fall that results is uncanny to watch, and I've only seen it paralleled by responses to my dislike of Chik-fil-A food.  (Again, not a very important issue, but people react with a harshness that is possibly only rivaled by popular reactions to rising gas prices.)

"This is the depression hotline.  Can I help you?"

"Yeah, I saw a Christmas decoration at Macy's."

"Is that a problem?"

"Don't you own a calendar?  It's only October!  I don't know  why I even bother to get out of bed, anymore.  I mean, what's the point of living?  My life is meaningless."

"Sir, this phone number is only for emergencies-"

"-It's like you don't even care!  Don't you  understand? I SAW A CHRISTMAS DECORATION BEFORE THANKSGIVING!"

But the stores in question aren't decorating for Christmas - they're selling decorations.  These stores couldn't possibly sell decorations to everyone who needed them just on the morning after Thanksgiving, so these things need to be on shelves and available for purchase.

But this doesn't matter to any people I know.  The very sight of red and green items on the shelves of Target sends passers by into an emotional frenzy that one wishes would be matched by their reaction to staggering unemployment levels or rising interest rates.  I've never understood this.

 Bwa-ha-ha!

Does Cracked.com Know More About the Bible than You (and Dan Brown)?

Cracked.com is a humor website that prints ridiculous stories about pop culture.  Even though it's irreverent and crude, their recent article called 5 Things You Won't Believe Aren't in the Bible was quite impressive (considering they spend most of their time trying to make dirty jokes out of normal things). It's remarkable how many people think they know the bible when they're really just remember Saturday morning cartoons.

On the issue of angels, Cracked points out that nothing about their flying feather appearance on Hallmark cards is correct and mentions examples of the truly frightening angels that are described in the Bible.  The Devil is a popular figure in mythology, but he is hardly mentioned in the Bible and Cracked explains that the Bible doesn't really tell us much about him (the same goes for Hell, which is glossed over in Scripture).  More tricky, however, is the anti-Christ who is mentioned in the Bible, but not really explained.  In fact, that term anti-Christ is  a complicated one that doesn't necessarily refer to a Biblical villain in each use.  Kudos to Cracked.com for understanding these issues.

But my favorite is the Holy Grail.  There's no Holy Grail.  It never existed, and it's most certainly not mentioned in the Bible.  It is never brought up by anyone until the late middle ages.  It. Isn't. Real.

 Bigfoot: more probable than the Holy Grail.

I hope Dan Brown reads that website.  Anyway, thanks to Cracked.com, some Biblical literacy has found its way into pop-culture.  Sadly, if some of my grad school colleagues read that article they would probably learn something...

Thinking Through Christopher Columbus - What He Did and Didn't Do

Today, my fellow Americans are celebrating Christopher Columbus day.  Fine by me - everyone likes a day off - but it's time that we understand who this guy was and just how such an ignoble man came to be seen as an icon.

Did Columbus Prove that the Earth was Round?

In the early 1800s, Washington Irving (Author of Sleepy Hollow and Rip Van Wnikle) wrote a work of historical fiction titled The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus.  In it, Irving describes Columbus as working against the popular notion that the earth was flat, and later proving that the earth was round by sailing to America.  Of course, it was a fictional story.  (Not to mention, that wouldn't really prove that the Earth was round.)

But schoolteachers decided that it was all true, and for two hundred years we've been teaching kids the same nonsense of Columbus and the flat earth theory when, in truth, the Europeans had believed in a round earth for a very long time.  Brilliant ancient minds, including Pythagoras and Aristotle, had already proven through mathematical observations that the planet must be round, and this point of view was dominant.  Washington Irving either didn't know this, or thought that his idea made a better story.  If he had known that he would screw up our schools for two hundred years he might have decided to write about something else.

 Of course, some teachers today use this book in the classroom...

Did He Discover America?

I probably don't need to say this, but the Vikings found the Americas long before Columbus.  (Of course, their "discovery" is also minimal since people were already here.)  The Vikings never set up any real settlements, but used Canada as a place to get lumber and bring it back to their homelands.  Historians are still working out the details, some say the Natives chased them away and some say that the Vikings just didn't have the manpower to settle so far away, but we know that Columbus wasn't the first European to get to America.

Not that Columbus would have understood this - he thought he was in India the whole time.  (Of course, it looked nothing like Marco Polo's descriptions, so maybe Columbus wasn't too bright.)

Was Columbus a Christian?

If you read some selections from his journal, you'll find that Columbus fancied himself a Believer - but you won't find him acting like one.  He doesn't mind writing about the murder of native civilians alongside claims that he is doing his work for God's glory.  This is pretty much how everyone wrote in late medieval Iberia, because everyone wanted to court the favor of the church.

I've noticed that in homecoming parades local politicians drive by in cars and show support for the local sports team.  Of course, they don't care about the sports team, they just want to be associated with that team in front of the local voters.  Medieval Christianity often worked in the same way; it was a very popular religion that everyone wanted to be associated with - even if they didn't care about it.

Was he Arrested in Spain?

Upon returning to Spain after many years of governing in America, the Spanish government  put Christopher Columbus in chains and found him guilty of barbaric treatment of natives.  His terrible treatment of the American Indians has become Columbus' legacy in recent years, and the old heroic images of Columbus have been replaced by pictures of a savage tyrant.  Rightly so.

So, what DID he do?

There is reason to remember him in our books.  Columbus' voyages sparked the wave of European colonialism that changed this entire hemisphere forever.  It's easy to dislike Columbus, but he does have an important place in the timeline of our world.

Also...

I read one of his letters earlier this year and discovered that Columbus was more complex than we had realized.  For example, the letter says that he wanted to use the resources from the New World to fund further Crusades to the Middle East.  There's some trivia we didn't learn in school.

Finding Billy the Kid (Photos)

I visited some central Texas areas, not too long ago, and go to see a lot of my favorite state on the long drive.  Believe it or not, the Texas countryside is largely unmolested by modernity and its beauty rivals that of any place I've been.  (I thought that the Italian countryside that I saw last year was slightly more beautiful, but while driving through Texas I decided that I had been wrong.)  On the way back home we got to check out some infamous Texas lore - the resting place of Billy the Kid.  (Maybe.)

In town's like Hico (which are near the Dr Pepper bottling plant) they have 'Dublin Dr Pepper' on tap.  On.  Tap.  This was at Dairy Queen.  I think the town should adopt the motto, "Visit Hico, Tx.  Come for Billy the Kid - stay for the Dr Pepper!"  Of course, some of you are scratching your head and wondering what a Dublin Dr Pepper is.  I'm sorry to tell you that you're missing out.  It's made with cane sugar, but there's something else special about their mix that I can't figure out.  Other places have used cane sugar in recent years to make my favorite soda, but the results are not the same.

This sign was in the bathroom of a Cracker Barrel.  It made me laugh.

William Henry Roberts claimed that he was Billy the Kid, and he had been living under a false name in Hico (sometimes calling himself "Brushy Bill) ever since faking his death.  No one is sure if he was telling the truth, but he knew a lot of details about the life of Billy the Kid that were not published and not easily accessed.  His grave is well kept by the city and looks very new.

And, for some reason, people put pennies on his tombstone.  I don't know why.  And someone puts flowers out, too.  Perhaps it's like the Poe Toaster, but since it's a small town no one ever sees him.  I'm sure if he every rises from the grave (zombie Billy the Kid...now that's a good idea) he'll use the pennies to by a Dublin Dr Pepper and will say, "If someone had invented this drink in my day I wouldn't have killed so many people."  Alas.

According to Wikipedia, this is the real grave of Billy the Kid (it's located in New Mexico).  More than one source claims he faked his death, so we're going to call it the "official" grave so that we can keep things interesting.  And what does Wikipedia know, anyway?

Equally amusing was this nearby tombstone which was obviously set up by a religious fanatic who is certain that their father has gone to Hell.  (Or, it's the grave of the guy who first started saying, "dadburnit."  My Texas History contacts haven't returned my calls.)

A Simple, but Very Effective, Way to Help the Needy in Your Area - Right Now

It's getting colder, and everyone is telling me how charmed they are by the coolness in the air and the advent of Winter.  I enjoy the Fall, as well, but I always feel some responsibility toward others at this time of the year.  It's exciting to walk out in the cold when you know you can go inside to a fireplace and some warm food, but many of our neighbors do not have a home or anything warm, at all - that's where we come in.

I have jackets and warm shirts I never wear.  Or, maybe I don't wear them very often, in which case I can do without them.  I might lament the loss of that perfect gray flannel that I wear while watching football games and eating chili, but I'll survive.  There are people in my neighborhood who sleep in the cold each night and the clothes in my closet could help many of them get through another winter, so I'm just going to have to be happy with a few less warm clothes.

You might be the kind of person who has lots of clothes and can't imagine doing without all of them.  That's OK.  Give a bunch of the away, and then you'll have an excuse to go shopping.  See?  Everybody wins.  Do you have children's clothes that are too small for your kids?  Even better.  Yeah, you might need those clothes if you have more kids, but there are kids on the street who need those clothes, right now.  I am willing to bet that everyone reading this has got an extra jacket or sweater, and who are we to hoard what we have?  Let's share our abundance with our neighbors and make this a happy season for everyone - not just the privileged.

Please don't put this off.  It's an emergency for many people.

...John answered, "The man with two tunics should share with him who has none, and the one who has food should do the same."