I asked my neighbors the other day what they where dressing up as for Halloween and they said that they (and the members of their church) do not celebrate it as it is a pagan festival. He carried on to say that he had enough trouble in his life without being possesed by demons!

I thought this strange but put it down to their church, I asked my other neighbors and they said they don't celebrate it either for the same reason. After asking all my neighbors only my neighbors who have just moved here from Virginia and us celebrate it. Apparently we will get very few visitors on Halloween as it is frowned upon around here (it hasn't stopped walmart being stuffed to the gills with Halloween stuff!)

Is this normal Southern behaviour or do I live in the village of the damned?

Patrick

Holly shit, it sounds like Stephen King Scenario. Have you noticed any candle-lit midnight meetings or heard any strange chanting lately. Any blonde virgins mysteriously disappeared in your town, only to be kept quiet by the odd looking inter bred town Sheriff ?

Lock your doors !!!

Rob

It gets very scary outside of the big cosmopolitan cities, perhaps you could go as a dead pope? a crucified Bill O'Reilly( I think he is looking to become a martyr) or even the ghost
Jesse Helms

Did you mention that Christmass was originally a pagan thing that the catholics adopted to convert the masses. The idea was to break the long winter with a big party.

Holy flying gobblins Patrick... you'd better tell me what town just in case!

On that note Vicars and Tarts party at my house... be there!

It's quite normal.. even in the UK..

Infact this very evening, My wife has been planning at our church, planning an "All Saints" Party, to give the kids an alternative to halloween, which is afterall based around evil spirits.. Would you really expect a church anywhere to celebrate evil?

As for the Christmas celebration, you'll find that yes, there was a pagan festival there, but instead of the pagan festival, Christians took the oppertunity to celebrate the birth of Christ..

If there's a baseball game on TV, and you don't like baseball, and so you watch football on a different channel instead, that doesn't mean you're watching baseball, just because baseball is on at the same time... You just chose to do something else in line with your own personal preferences instead ..

~ Jon

All Saints day is known as All Hallows day, thus the word Halloween for the day before it. The rest is just Hallmark making big bucks and we should look at it as fun and not evil!

But I understand what your saying about the baseball, if the Yankees are on they are evil and we should avoid them, gotcha

Patrick

This has given me food for thought ......

Here in Texas (Southern state) ...

1) they go mad at Halloween, light up their houses and yards (gardens), cover everything with spider web, dress up their kids and themselves, and their pets!!! - tour the streets till around 10pm - devour our supply of treat bags (usually we start at around 120- then rush to Walmart for more) ....

2) we have "a Church on every corner..." suddenly realised after coming here from the UK that we were in the middle of the bible belt.... at times we feel they get quite fanatical about their religion - but .......

Does their ... make everything BIG and GLITZY (1) over-ride their religious fanatacism (2) ?

Pleasantville mixed with Las Vegas = :scared:

Go on Patrick - introduce "BIG and GLITZY"

I live in NC and we usually have a good turnout of kids on halloween. Some houses have the cobwebs and lights out, and many more on the development will be lit up before the end of the month.

I guess it depends on which part of NC you happen to be in.

I just love some of the fright antics people will come up with at Halloween. Has any one seen those cars driving around with the fake foot hanging out of the trunk? I just love that one!!