‘Churches’ Celebrate Halloween With Zombies, Dancing Skeletons, ‘Haunted Hayrides’ and ‘Spooktaculars’

Conservative, Christian-identifying churches nationwide are hosting Halloween-themed events throughout the month of October, some featuring or including Halloween-centered sermons and performances, haunted hayrides, and/or costume contests with children and adults alike dressing up up as skeletons, ghosts, witches and other images of death or evil.

Chet Gallagher, a Christian activist and missions pastor who formerly served as a Nevada police officer, recently posted a short video of a “trunk or treat” event being held at Journey Church in Lebanon, Tennessee. He said in the recording that he decided to stop and to record video of the happenings outside of the church “to expose how absolutely horrific and wicked it can be for these ‘trunk or treat’ events.”

Gallagher then walked to a van that was parked near the entrance to show that sitting inside the back of the open van was a life-size skeleton, with an inflatable angry ghost attached to the side of the vehicle. He noted that the parking lot was still busy after the event was over.

“This is front of a Christian church. How can something so demonic be displayed at one of the largest churches in Lebanon, Tennessee?” he asked. “Again, all this hoorah on this so-called trunk or treat, and this is a representation. What is wrong with this picture?”

Gallagher also shared a photograph of a sign at nearby Shop Springs Baptist Church, which advertised that it was holding a “fall festival,” which includes a costume contest. The church has since posted photos of the event online.

One photograph shows three young girls with their face painted, one with plastic fangs in her mouth, and another donning a skeleton costume with smaller skulls on her dress. Another photograph shows a man with a skull in the back of his jeep and a ghost hanging inside.

A third photograph shows a mother donning a Wicked Witch of the West costume in reference to “The Wizard of Oz,” and a fourth photograph included a woman with elaborate face paint in the fashion of “El Dia De Los Muertos” (The Day of the Dead).

A photograph also displayed the trophy for “best costume,” which depicts a headless skeleton holding its skull in its hands.

A number of churches nationwide either hosted, plan to host, or took their youth out for a “haunted hayride,” including Chatham Friends Church in Snow Camp, North Carolina; Stony Creek Community Church in Stony Creek, New York; Fellowship Baptist in Maineville, Ohio; and Freedom Church of Osage Beach, Missouri.

“It’s going to be AWESOME! We will have a costume contest, games, candy, lots of food, and of course, a scary hayride,” Freedom Church wrote on its social media page.

CityLight Benson Church in Omaha, Nebraska utilized its parking lot on Saturday for an area “Zombie Walk” as a means to “make friends” with its neighbors in the city.

“Over 1,000 dressed-up zombies will begin congregating in our church’s parking lot at 6 p.m. We will be provid[ing] food and a free photo booth. This will be a great way to let the city know who we are!” the CityLight website reads.

Church by the Glades in Coral Springs, Florida presented a series of Halloween-themed messages called “Spooktacular” throughout the month of October, including sermons entitled “How to Hug a Vampire” and “Escaping a Haunted Mansion.” Services included Halloween-spun live remakes of secular hits, such as Michael Jackson’s “Scream” —performed with a cemetery theme—and George Thorogood’s “Bad to the Bone”—performed with dancers dressed as skeletons.

“We all have scary skeletons in the closet. Whether it’s something that has afflicted us for years or something that happened just yesterday, we all are looking to escape the haunting that comes from past mistakes. Join us for ‘Escaping a Haunted Mansion’ as we talk about leaving the past in the past and looking forward to fulfilling our purpose in Christ,” the church website reads.

On Oct. 29 and 30, Church by the Glades also hosted trunk-or-treat in the church parking lot, with admission being one bag of candy.

The Church at Lake Forest in Walls, Mississippi hosted its “Spooktacular” on Sunday evening, featuring costume contests and a giveaway for a Nintendo Switch. The sermon series for the month is the Halloween theme “Ghost,” which refers to the Holy Spirit.

“SPOOKTACULAR is a family-friendly event that includes an amazing service, high-energy worship, costumes, games, food, and candy for all kids!” the church website states.

Compassion Church in Hartwell, Georgia is holding a block party on Halloween night to “celebrate our city.” It will similarly give away a Nintendo game system during the event, as well as a 50″ television.

Passion Church in Maple Grove, Minnesota also recently presented its annual Michael Jackson “Thriller” performance with a Halloween theme, and held a separate costume parade for the children. The Oct. 21 sermon was entitled “Haunted House” and a costume and dance party is scheduled for Halloween night for middle and high school-aged youth.

Some churches state that celebrating Halloween is a matter of conscience, and is up to each individual. Newspring Church in Anderson, South Carolina writes on its website that Christians “must not impose our personal conscience issues on others.”

“The Bible doesn’t directly say not to participate in Halloween. What the Bible doesn’t explicitly prohibit, we have the freedom to make decisions about using wisdom and guidance from the Holy Spirit to lead us. If we listen to Jesus and do what He says, He will never lead us away from Himself,” it states. “If dressing in costumes and going door to door offends your conscience, don’t do it. If it doesn’t bother you, celebrate Halloween.”

Matt Chandler of The Village Church in Flower Mound, Texas similarly released a video last week in which he opined that Halloween is, to most people, “probably far less about demons and witches” and “far more about candy and costumes and fun for the kids.” He pointed to Scripture in the New Testament about meat offered to idols and said that if one’s “conscience is pricked,” they shouldn’t celebrate Halloween, but if one’s “conscience is clear,” they should use the event within boundaries to meet one’s neighbors and practice hospitality.

However, others state that Halloween presents serious spiritual concerns because it subtly introduces children to evil under the banner of fun or dress-up.

“Demons are for real. Witches are for real. Sorcery is for real. There is nothing good or clean or funny about any of it,” wrote Alan Morrison of Diakrisis International. “To encourage children to be involved in such things in any way is surely irresponsible and can ultimately be damaging to their spiritual health.”

“It is indeed true that Christ ‘disarmed principalities and powers’ and ‘made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them’ (Col. 2:15); but it is bizarre in the extreme to make a joke out of those evil powers, even impersonating them at fancy dress parties,” he said. “It completely minimises that evil power (and the power of the gospel to take away that power) if we just join in the world’s jokey, festive, celebrational attitude toward the dark purveyors and vehicles of that evil power.”

“[I]s it really cute to let your child dress up like Satan, vampires, ghosts, witches, zombies, or dead people? How can we teach our children to stay away from sin when we adults encourage dabbling with the dark side, too?” also asked Joshua Infantado of Biblical Truths.com.

He said that Christians are to be separate from the world, not joining in its activities.

“Christians are to live in the world but should NOT be part of the world. There’s a huge difference between the two. Participating in the celebration of Halloween is one way for you to become part of the world. God called us to be HOLY—set apart for a special purpose. God can’t use us for His work if we continue to be a part of this world’s system,” he said.

John Ramirez, a New York City evangelist who had been involved in Santeria and Palo Mayombe for over two decades before being set free by the power of Christ, also has spoken strongly on the topic from experience as a former occultist.

“Let’s get it straight. People come to the church because the Holy Spirit draws you to the church. Our job is to preach truth … Let’s stop mixing this whole situation with the world and the Church, because you know what you get when you mix things up? You get something that’s deformed, and Christ is never in it,” he said in an online interview. “So, let truth be truth, and let’s stop playing games with the things of God. Let’s stop playing games and dressing it up and calling it Jesus.”

“Jesus is not in Halloween,” Ramirez, author of “Unmasking the Devil,” said. “C’mon. I practiced these things for 25 years. … There were different levels how we celebrated Halloween. There were different levels how we put witchcraft on people’s door depending on how they dressed the door up. … When you carve the pumpkin, when you put the pumpkin at your door, you are inviting that principality into your house.”

“Why is it that we need to celebrate something that has to do with the world? Something that has a demonic history about it, how is it that we are going to slap the name Jesus on it and make it ours?” he asked.

“We are quick on our feet to rush and honor the devil in so many ways. We see no harm in Halloween, because we think it is fun,” Ramirez also wrote in an article published by Charisma News. “We paint our faces, we wear our innocent costumes, we dress up our doorways—even churches dress up their entryways for Halloween with pumpkins. [But] these actions are like giving the devil license, saying, ‘Here’s my church. You can have it.’”

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