The Curious Connection Between Halloween and Reformation Day
Reflecting on a Divine irony
Today, our culture celebrates a shadowy resemblance of an historically Christian liturgical holiday. The traditional aim of Halloween — All Hallows (or ‘Saints’) Eve — is to remember faithfully departed Christians. Now, most people, even most Christians I’d venture, merely understand Halloween in terms of the shadowy modern liturgy: get scared inside a haunted house, fill up on festive candies, and experience the disguised holiday while ironically donning a disguise of one’s choosing.
Today is Reformation Day as well, or the day Jesus came knocking, according to one writer. On this day, almost five hundred years ago, German priest and professor, Martin Luther, effectively changed the world and formally began what became known as the Protestant Reformation.
The protest has endured to this day, though, because it carried doctrinal rebuke along with moral rebuke.
As Reformed writer Jon Bloom puts it, Luther literally acted as Jesus “pounding on the door of a church whose trust in an idol put them in grave spiritual danger.” His pounding — whether it be Luther’s or Jesus’ is a matter of perspective — focused on more than merely the obvious moral corruption of some Catholic leaders. The protest has endured to this day because it carried doctrinal rebuke along with moral rebuke.
Apart from his 95 theses, Luther began teaching that justification (i.e., how one was saved) was by faith alone, which Rome balked at. The Church held that faith must be perfected by love if one is to be justified. But as Luther continued to read the apostle Paul’s writings, his conscience was captivated by this new teaching. The young priest felt the justification (pun intended) needed to protest. Why? Because if Rome didn’t agree with him, they were teaching another gospel. The apostle Paul makes it clear, “But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed” (Gal. 1:8). Protesting, then, was the only way.
It is an alien righteousness, or more festively apropos, righteousness in disguise.
So, what was Luther’s understanding of justification by faith alone? Briefly, Luther defined justification proper as the sinner being judicially pardoned by an act of God imputing Jesus Christ’s righteousness onto the sinner by virtue of a passive faith. Imputing is the key active term differentiating his theology from predecessors, including Augustine. For Luther, if one has faith alone, God the Father sees the sinner as if he were Jesus (coram deo) and judges accordingly. This is how man is made right with God (justified), with an alien righteousness, or more festively apropos, righteousness in disguise. This was the true gospel; lost within cancerous Rome.
Bloom is convinced Luther did, in fact, give “chemotherapy to the cancer of spiritual corruption” and helped recover “belief in the gospel of Christ.” And thus, we — I use that pronoun with hesitance — Protestants celebrate Luther’s Wittenburg protest (October 31, 1517) as Reformation Day!
Without wading into the complex philosophical and theological waters of this divisive doctrine, read a little more from whom celebrants of Reformation Day get their belief: Paul. In 1 Corinthians 13, the apostle writes:
If I speak in the tongues of men and angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing … faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
If I have all faith,” Paul passionately says, but have not love, I am nothing.” He is assuredly meaning a faith in God through Jesus Christ. Not just some faith either; all faith. And what does Paul gain without love? Nothing.
Ponder on Paul’s repeated use of the word nothing. Nothing denotes the absence of anything. Colloquially, it also refers to things lacking importance, interest, value, relevance, or significance. So, is eternal life in heaven with God and Jesus NOTHING? Absurd. Paul’s rhetorical point gives readers a theological hint.
If Luther recovered the apostle’s doctrine of justification, then Paul must think eternal life in heaven with God and Jesus is nothing.
Go back to Luther’s concept of justification. By faith alone, one is made right with God and gains eternal life through Christ’s imputed righteousness — righteousness in disguise. If Luther recovered the ancient apostle’s doctrine of justification from cancerous Rome, then Paul must think eternal life in heaven with God and Jesus is nothing. Or, Luther’s interpretation is wrong, and Paul — accompanied by the voice of historic Christianity throughout the ages — actually thought what counts is “only faith working through love” (Gal. 5:6).
Hmm… It’s odd Halloween and Reformation Day share the same date.
Or is it?
Perhaps the connection between these two holidays is more than merely October 31st. Perhaps both are a bit haunted by history. And perhaps both, through the power of a frighteningly subjective cultural democracy, represent only a disguised and shadowy resemblance of the truth.
Halloween and Reformation Day: quite the divine irony… or clue.
