People are fine with being disrespectful to Christians

[Flymetothezoom]

At a church playgroup. The people who run it are very devout Christians. I am taken aback, by the number of parents, who thought it was appropriate to bring their kids to the church dressed for Halloween. Kids are dressed as witches, goblins, skeletons, creepy pumpkins etc..
The church holds a light party every year on Halloween and is very clear that they do not endorse Halloween.

Judaism, Islam and Sikhism all have major festivals of light, you know. Heard of Chanukah?

We can talk about the appropriation of the festival and why that happened 100s of years ago and whether than should have happened. But we are where we are now and church light parties are just an alternative offering for modern secular halloween, bearing in mind tolerance and choice is part of being a multicultural society.

It works both ways though. The OP is really not coming across as very tolerant.

How are you defining "witch" and do you believe that witches (your definition) exist?

Or are you saying that the idea of witches is unchristian, and that things like fiction books about witches are therefore also unchristian?

if a mosque held a party on Halloween and Muslims complained that people turned up dressed for Halloween, then sure, why wouldn’t it?

As this is a thread about a Christian doing exactly that in regards to a church party, it’s hardly surprising that that’s where the criticism is being directed.

As far as I care Christians can do what they want, except ask questions of others that relate to their own fairy-tails

An answer here is that, if they start on about evil in others, just ask what they're planning to do about the evil of child abuse within their organisation

In the context of it having infested so many religions and of their claims to be moral examples, I find it's a rare church leader who'll wish to continue the discussion once this is raised

Perhaps everyone should have been advised of this then and no dark stuff stipulated.

But this isn’t a thread about Muslims.
To me, all religions are mumbo jumbo, and people are absolutely bonkers in taking part in any of them.

@Flymetothezoom

Or took my kid to a Synagogue dressed as a ham sandwich?

I'm sorry OP, I know you're attempting to be goady and mildly racist, but (speaking as a Jew), this is one of the most hilarious and stupid attempts at whataboutery that I've ever encountered.

I would LOVE to see you turn up at my shul with your child "dressed as a ham sandwich". Honestly. I would bloody love to see the expressions on people's faces. It would be talked about for weeks.

"I'm so gutted I was on holiday! Tell me again!"

Perhaps. But pagans also light jack-lanterns and candles to guide their ancestors, so the idea of the festival of light is also something the Christians appropriated from the old ways.

There's just no escaping it ...

Still a bit confused. There are lots of Christian posters on here whose denominations don't have an issue with Halloween. So I wouldn't expect non-Christians to know that Halloween costumes are not acceptable in your particular church - unless they are explicitly told. If they are explicitly told, then the parents should respect that, but it's not clear that they were. I'm not sure about Dress as a Ham Sandwich ethics. 😂. My Moslem friend bought her daughter a whole load of Peppa Pig merch for Ramadan!

If you want to run a playgroup that is purely and only for members of the church I would support the churches right to do that. If however you choose to run a playgroup that is open to members of the community (as many churches do) members of the church will inevitably be exposed to the beliefs and norms of the community at large
I would argue it's the opposite actually.If it's a community group which just happens to rent a room in the church building then I wouldn't expect any religious content, but if it's a Church run group I'd expect it to be run in accordance with that Church's beliefs and for members of the wider community to be exposed to the beliefs and norms of the Church if they choose to attend.
I think it's a different argument if it's something like Church influence in schools which are largely state funded and may be the only option in some areas, but if a religious organisation is running and self funding play groups, social activities etc that are entirely voluntary then surely they can make any rules they like as long as they're legal? I wouldn't expect a Jewish group to serve pork, or a Muslim one to accept people drinking alcohol at events no matter what the norm is in wider society, so if this particular group doesn't want to celebrate Halloween that's their business . Lots of people have beliefs that seem odd to lots of other people but if we don't like the way groups like this do things we are not obliged to attend. I think the religious group should make it's stance clear so that people know what they are going to but as long as they're not breaking any laws they have the freedom to practice their religion as they wish, and others have the freedom to attend or not as they wish.There's no suggestion in the OP that this Church is trying to prevent people celebrating Halloween elsewhere, just that they don't want it on their premises, which is their prerogative isn't it?

Every religion has lights festivals, some religious festivals overlap, some are historic choices to match another religion's date. Pretty much every strongly seasonal culture has a midwinter and a midsummer festival of some sort plus harvest and spring festival. Tropical and equatorial cultures show different patterns. Those are used by every religion as it comes along and replaces a predecessor. No one faith gets to call exclusive dibbs on such times.

October 31st is All Hallows Eve and a festival as in its own right.

The recent fad amongst some Christian sects for eschewing traditional church Halloween in favour of rainbow parties and light parties seems directly at odds with the nature of All Hallows which has never been a lights festival. However I don't see how its disrespecting a completely different religion who celebrate something else on the same day.

As I'm sure you know, most of modern paganism practice is rooted in the early 20th century and revivals rather than the form which was overwhelmed by early Christianity.

As for all the Christians you meet being petty minded bigots - you may need to broaden your circle. Every group has its nutters, its mainstreamers and its slightly odds - Christians, Pagans and Evangelical Atheists included.

Disagree.

I suppose they could go as something worse.
They could go as Christians in olde religious garb and play act that they're revelling in burning innocent women alive because the women are either too good looking, too popular, have an education, are good at helping the sick get better or whatever other imagined "sin" they've unwittingly committed? I'd rather my children emulate demons, ghosts or witches than religious people.

For those asking. The church is a Baptist church.

Once again, this was a playgroup that runs every Monday. It was not a party, just a normal stay and play group inside the church. The Light party is tonight.

Religions and spirituality are part of culture, stories, history. The evidence of these beliefs is still all around us, and many major tents of many different belief systems overlap and intersect, as do stories (and theories) surrounding the universe, nature and the gods.

I can't not be fascinated by that, I think our culture would be less rich, diverse and interesting without those stories, which are part of human civilization.

Oh, and having had a quick google, one church in the neighboring county is advertising a ‘spooktacular kids party’, and another is a doing a horror movie night.

considering anti-Halloween sentiment is clearly not a uniform Christian belief, it’s not really surprising that parents thought Halloween costumes were appropriate for a church party held on Halloween.

I'm a Christian and got torn to pieces asking how to get more people to attend church on here.The general consensus on here is we're all a load of child abusers/sweaty nonces who brainwash people and hate gays.

Were you attending the church group with your child or are you a volunteer at the group? Was anyone else offended?

OP, the Bible teaches that if a rape victim isn't heard screaming for help, she should be executed because she must have secretly been enjoying it. If you're not offended by the Bible, but ARE offended by toddlers dressed as pumpkins, then your sense of morality is rather skewed.

Even the pagan festival of Samhain was about warding off and protecting from evil spirits and bringing good health and fortune for coming winter. It's not about celebrating and glorifying evil.

I have never attended a church play group and I never run my own events in a
church.

im not sure where the room for confusion is in my post.

I don’t condone the church or it’s teachings and have done my level best to keep its insidious touch away from me since I was able to make choices for myself.

@MrsAvocet you explained it far better than I have.

So they took their kids, who were excited about Halloween, in costumes they probably really wanted to wear. Big deal 🤷🏻‍♀️

I mean, to be fair, given that your best argument was "what if I took my child to synagogue dressed as a ham sandwich", that's a fairly low bar.