Today (or some say November 1) is Samhain, the ancient Celtic celebration observed in later times as Halloween. The transformation of the early holiday to what it is now reveals the undercurrents of fear and denial in our culture. Samhain was dedicated to honoring the ancestors and asking for their guidance. Those most adept at communicating with spirits in the beyond became known as witches. Today’s Halloween demonizes all three—spirits, the beyond, and witches.
Gone is the knowledge that honoring our ancestors is vital to our individual and community health. African shaman Malidoma Somé says that his people believe that a society cannot hope to be healthy if it is disconnected from its ancestors, and he regards this disconnection in the U.S. as a primary source of the escalating violence and loss of meaning among its citizens. Master physician and healer Dietrich Klinghardt speaks of the energetic legacy of disconnection from ancestors as a component in physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual illness.
Turning from the past has become a way of life in the U.S. Don’t look and maybe it won’t be true. Likewise, turning from death is the American way. If you don’t want to look at death, you don’t want to ackowledge ancestors or spirits on the other side of the veil that is so thin at this time of year. That ghosts and skeletons have become objects of fear, the titillating scary creatures of Halloween, shows American aversion to death and reluctance to turn and face the veil, much less pull it back.
Witches, with their ability to move between the worlds, make people who don’t want to look uncomfortable. Demonizing them and turning them into ugly hags takes care of that problem. Along with the witches, go their familiars. These are the animals, reptiles, and amphibians that witches commune with and that assist the witch in doing the spiritual and healing work for her community and for Earth.
Black cats are the most famous of the familiars and another icon of Halloween. The fear of witches resulted in labeling both witch and cat as capable of cursing you and bringing bad luck into your life. Many people don’t know that, in many cases, an accused witch’s familiars were killed along with her during the centuries-long holocaust of witch burnings. The number of cats that were killed in Europe during this time was so great that in the aftermath the rat population swelled to unprecedented proportions. A rat-borne plague then ravaged Europe. The fear of black cats has not died; humane societies report that they are the hardest to place in new homes.
Instead of celebrating fear, let’s return the wonder to Halloween. The wonder of deep connection. The wonder of being able to talk to our ancestors and receive their valuable counsel (they’ve been here and can help us avoid the mistakes of the past). The wonder of the spirit world. The wonder of black cats.
© Stephanie Marohn, 2007