Halloween Channel
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In the United States and Canada, every October brings an avalanche of carved pumpkins, dancing skeletons, smiling ghosts, and witches riding on brooms. Halloween certainly stands out from the rest of the holidays we observe throughout the year: It's full of frightening ghost stories, pranks, elaborate costumes and bizarre games. On Halloween, we all revel in being scared.

Halloween also stands out because of its unique mix of secular and religious elements. In recent years, the holiday has stirred up a lot of controversy because it offends some Christian groups, which in turn upsets many modern-day Wiccans and Druids.

If you've ever wondered where all those peculiar Halloween practices come from, or you can't figure out why Halloween is such a hot topic with a lot of people, then this article will get you ready for the next October 31. We'll look at both the Celtic and Christian origins of Halloween, examine all the favorite Halloween traditions and sort out a little bit of the Halloween controversy.

The next time you're carving a pumpkin or handing out candy to little Draculas and Darth Vaders, you'll actually know where these practices come from.

One obvious question about Halloween is, "What does the word itself mean?" The name is actually a shortened version of "All Hallows' Even," the eve of All Hallows' Day. "Hallow" is an Old English word for "holy person," and All Hallows' Day is simply another name for All Saints' Day, the day Catholics commemorate all the saints. At some point, people began referring to All Hallows' Even as "Hallowe'en" and then simply "Halloween."

Following the Jewish tradition, Christians observe many holy days from sundown on one day until sundown on the following day. This is where we get the practice of celebrating Christmas Eve, New Year's Eve, etc. The direct predecessor of modern-day Halloween is the festivity that began All Saints' Day, which started at sundown on October 31.

While it takes its name from All Saints' Day, modern Halloween is actually a combination of several different traditions. In fact, a lot of the things we do on Halloween predate Christianity entirely. In the following sections, we'll look at the chief traditions that feed into today's Halloween and see how they got all tangled up together in one holiday.